Warlord of the Dead
by RapiDe
Summary: So many people have predicted the world will end for one reason or another, yet they were all wrong. BloodRayne just hopes SHE is...
1. Chapter 1

Legal disclaimers: I don't own or lay claim to BloodRayne the character, the game or anything which is directly connected to these properties, they all belong to the computer company Majesco, I'm just borrowing them to write a fictional story set in the world of BloodRayne. The character of the Magdalena is also not mine, she belongs to Top Cow comics I believe. However, all original characters, plotlines and ideas created for the purposes of this story belong to me. Therefore, please ask before borrowing any of them.

Disclaimers: Due to particular subject matter and some graphic violence, this story will not be to everyone's tastes. For example, if you find the idea of BloodRayne being attracted to another woman unthinkable, you should not read this story. However, more seriously, segments of the story are set during World War II and involve actions and activities some people may find repulsive. Apologies for any offence taken in advance, but I never write anything like this without good reason. Please bear that in mind. Feedback and Reviews would be appreciated and I will do my best to answer anyone who does so. Feel free to Flame, I appreciate everything constructive.

**Lost**

_Eastern France, 1943_

In the village of Briem, named after a long-ago forgotten founder, there had never been much to be seen. A small grey stone church, cream-painted brick and dark wood houses so old they almost seemed as though they should have been thatched despite slate roofs. An old stone mill with slowly turning sails moved by the summer wind sat atop a hillside just outside the village, a slight river brown with mud and compost running near it. A grey road ran through the entire village, passing by the mill on the way, where it turned off onto a dirt track.

These things were all that there was, they formed and made the village of Briem. They were nothing, _it_ was nothing. Everything was illuminated in the warm summer sun, cooled by the wind to a pleasant touch of heat and light. The sun was high in the bright blue sky, some few wispy white clouds drifted by, shading nothing. It was a perfect, brilliant summer day.

None of it helped, none of it meant anything, not now, not to him. Father Jacob Matthews stood in the street outside his church and felt Death lay its cold fingers across his Soul. He wanted to Pray, to beg, to plead. But he didn't, he couldn't. He looked again at the sight that had cursed his eyes, stolen his breath and scorched his heart to a cinder.

"Please, I beg of you, do not do this" he said again, slowly, not even trying to keep the desperation and fear from his voice any more. They could smell his fear in any case, he didn't doubt it, particularly _her_. He had stared through the Gates of Hell, looking down at his damnation was his answer.

The woman kneeling over the bloody body wore the dark black uniform of the SS, the Deaths Head skulls evident in the sun on the collar of her shirt. Black leather boots creaked as she moved, reaching down slowly and carefully to close the dead mans eyes. As she moved her curly ice-blonde hair shimmered in the light, highlighted her fine features as the uniform did her slender, curved body, hard muscle shifting as she did.

The woman was a thing of beauty, a creation of imagination and fantasy to stir the blood and speed the heart, but now she seemed more as Death's Angel come amongst them. She stood slowly away from the corpse with liquid animal grace and directed a look at him he could only describe as feral. Her dark-brown eyes were chips of Arctic ice, he felt as though he was paddling the River Styx merely meeting them. She could not have been more striking, a sensual, devastating vision of the flesh, young and beautiful, a thing to die for. What she was in truth? He knew not.

The man dead at her feet was one of hers, a soldier sent to guard them, dressed in a dark Wehrmacht uniform. His helmet was damaged, a chunk of skull was missing from where blood and brains mixed with traces of bone flooded out to the soft ground. His rifle was missing, no one knew who'd done it. What the Germans knew, what she knew, what he knew, was that a villager had done it. Other soldiers had surrounded everyone in the village gathered in the village square, two hundred men, women and children, shaking, scared, weeping and Praying, asking God for forgiveness, looking to him for help. He had nothing to give, he knew of no help he could possibly summon or be of. They were, he didn't doubt, all going to die.

Later, he would wish that he had been right. Prayer, then, meant nothing to him.

"In the name of God, there are women and children here. In His name, I ask of you forgiveness. He who committed this act not know what he did and will be judged before Heaven for his Sins" said Father Matthews, his voice so quiet he almost felt as though he was fading like a ghost and had as little meaning. It changed nothing, he knew she heard every word.

She strode over to him, glanced up and down his soft, middle aged body-then slammed a fist into his stomach with awful strength. He doubled over and threw up before he collapsed on his face, falling into a pile of limp pain, stinking of fear. His scalp hit the hard ground and he felt the grit bite, felt blood drip down his face over his cheek. He didn't move, but she strode away.

She strode up to a mother and father with a young child-Pierre Ducos, his Wife Isabella, their ten year old Lena-then stopped, knelt in front of them. For a moment. He noticed, for a terrible moment of time that would be frozen in his mind for the rest of his long life, that the fingernails on her right hand seemed to have grown, become more shaped and hard, like claws... Her arm whipped across so quick he glimpsed blood flicker in the air before his numbed mind took in the sight of little Lena dead on the ground, her throat torn out.

Pierre screamed and lunged at the woman, but a casual backhand took his eyes out of his head as well as shredding his nose and upper face. He reeled back, his face a nightmare of blood and bone, screamed once and fell over backwards, hands clamped over his face as his white shirt turned thick with his blood. He was already dead. Isabella took a step away and then stopped, a breath before a soldier shot her in the head with an almost casual pistol shot that put her down beside her husband and child.

The woman soldier brought her hand up to her face and licked the blood off of her fingernails-her claws, before she turned to face the horrified, sickened Father Matthews again. He almost died at the sight.

Her eyes had changed. Brown humanity had changed to gold, a vertical, slender iris had become the centre, a thing darker than the Abyss, deeper than the reach of Hell itself. Her teeth were shifting, becoming sharper, more pointed, her fingernails were shifting and growing longer. Her body was almost rippling, as though muscle and bone were shifting underneath her skin.

He'd been about to ask God just what of Earth could do such things as he had witnessed here, but now he knew. Something shrivelled and died inside him at the knowledge. _She wasn't human..._

"God is not here today, Priest" she said, slowly, quietly, her voice almost a growl but still sweet as honey and nectar to the ears. He felt physically ill even thinking of that, now. "So you must take his place. Choose" she continued, waving wide to everyone gathered around them, his people, his Flock. He felt a terrible cold settle deep inside him, some part of him knew what was coming.

"I don't-" he began, trying to stand up, but she didn't wait for him to finish. She was, he believed, enjoying this.

"They are your "Flock". Where you lead, they follow, yes? So choose. Twelve Disciples of yours will survive here. Choose" she said, golden eyes swallowing him whole and spitting out the remnants, black centres gorging on his Soul.

"I can't do that" he said, finally getting to his feet, trembling and weak. She couldn't mean that, there had to be something he could do, something he could say. "Take me, instead. I am their Shepherd, their Sins begin and end with me. Let that be an end to it" he said, hoping against hope...

"Ha" replied the woman, before reaching down and tearing off Pierre's arm. He was already dead, but he still jerked when she did it. Blood drenched the ground around her, then her uniform-then her, as she bit deep into the flesh and tore out a broad chunk. Everyone but the other soldiers were speechless and far worse than lost in fear and fright at the sight, even as she slowly chewed the flesh and swallowed it, needle-sharp fangs emerging from her mouth as she worked her mouth. Blood coated her like a human sacrifice. Father Matthews wanted to throw up. He didn't, he couldn't do anything at all.

"You have no more choices here, Priest. Choose" she repeated, one last time.

Slowly, with the terrible, lethal finality of Death itself, Father Matthews arm came up, his hand clenched-his finger pointed. Then again, again, nine more times after that. He chose his Disciples, knowing that she and the soldiers would merely have killed them all if he'd refused.

It took him a long, terrible hour, a time in his life which never had real meaning to him again. After that, the killing began, then the burning, whoops, cries, laughter and growls of beasts, creatures and soldiers drunk on slaughter, pain, bloodlust and drink.

As he led his Disciples away, he felt the man he had been for all of these years leave him and stay far away behind, that man stayed and watched everyone and everything he knew be utterly destroyed, the land salted. The man who led his Disciples away to the truth of what could come next never looked back. His heart and mind were already broken...

_Berlin, Germany, 1945_

Sister Victoria slowly, carefully, made her way up and out of the bunker, past dead, bloody bodies, scattered shell casings, half-burnt papers and weapons tossed and toppled everywhere. The crack of gunfire was still a constant in the near and far distance, explosions rang out and echoed almost constantly, screams and wails sounded everywhere. A howling whine echoed not far away, which she recognised as an artillery shell falling, then a flash-crack of massive detonation echoed all around before a terrible crashing, rolling roar of sound echoed, shaking the ground itself with impact as a big building collapsed nearby. Entire blocks of masonry, huge shards of glass and bits and pieces of furniture flew and were flung past, half a roof carving a deep cut into shattered mud and tarmac ground nearby before utterly disintegrating.

The War was over, the Third Reich had lost, but its insane leader wouldn't admit it and had gone on planning further conquest, victories and the future of the thousand-year Reich from his bunker at the heart of a collapsing Empire he had completely lost any grasp on. A fanatic and a demagogue to the very last, blind to whatever truth didn't suit him, Adolph Hitler had kept those near him in thrall regardless of everything-until she'd come in.

Now mere woman could breach the Fuhrer's bunker, it was an _impossibility_. Even as she'd slaughtered his guards left and right, gunning down everyone standing with her Schmeisser and her pistol, one weapon in each hand, bullets cracking into walls and doors, sparking off of steel and shattering wood, puncturing plaster, he'd screamed defiance like a madman. Raising high the Spear of Destiny, clutched hard in his hand-utter desecration-he'd drawn his Lunger and opened fire himself, declaring that he would never be defeated.

Easily avoiding his futile attack, she'd shown him the error of his ways-literally, as she'd used her gift of Redemption Sight to force the short madman to confront himself with everything he'd ever done, the truth burning into that tattered black rag he'd called a Soul. A second later he'd put his pistol in his own mouth and blown the back of his head off. She'd simply retrieved the Spear, sheathed it across her back in the straps provided and left, job done. One couldn't get personally involved in these things, no matter the abomination. The Church knew what had to be done, she was merely its chosen tool...

She looked out into the nightmare wasteland of collapsing Berlin, dying in pieces around its dead leader as the Russians drove inside. The Reich Chancellery was gone, a shattered, shredded ruin from which the Hammer and Sickle flag now flew, bathed in the bloody red of Soviet triumph. Every building in sight was shattered, smashed, ruined or simply destroyed. People cowered in cellars, hid in dark alleys or just ran away in futile desperation, broken and starving, the only thing left for them to make futile efforts at survival.

Animals were killed, butchered and eaten on the streets, people's throats were slit for rotten apples and dull knives, money was worthless except as firewood. Rotten, ruined clothes failed to cover peoples skin and bones, blood, bodies and metal of every kind-bullets, shells, ruined tanks, the remains of people lives in the form of plates and cutlery-were everywhere, covered every surface. A cold wind cut to the bone and sliced away life faster and sharper than any blade while at any moment a piece of the dying War could strike down anyone, a shell obliterating a lost soul scavenging for food and survival. Fires burned everywhere, but not one of them was for warmth. What pitiful little was left was going up in smoke literally in front of those who needed it most...

War was Hell Sister Victoria, sometimes known as the Magdalena, had been taught, told and shown countless dozens of times. This, though...this was Hell in full sight, sound and fury drawn up to Earth fought before God. One could only experience this, never talk or "know" about it... She said a quick Prayer for those left behind, crossing herself at what she saw and heard-then she saw something else. Some_one_, that made her blood run cold with fury and anger...

She saw the long, powerful, dark-black furred form-a Panther, here in Berlin-lope past a nearby building slowly, darting from cover to cover. It-_she_-had been heading for the Bunker, but had slowed down sharply on seeing her. The Hidden Inquisition's records were exact and meticulously kept, even in this time of War and chaos, even after everything. More importantly, she was the _Magdalena_, no evil escaped her sight-and she knew monstrosity when she saw it. Only one Demon of _that_ kind had ever worked for the Reich, one's whose actions and reputation were things of dark myth even now...

**...Rakshasa...**

She snapped her Schmeisser up and opened fire, the automatic pistol clattering loudly as bullets spat out at the Demon. The Demon span fast just as she moved, leaping through an empty window inside a building where it vanished, even as bullets chewed up stone and plaster where it had been standing a second before. She sprinted for the building, ignoring scattered, ruined human shapes and figures fleeing at a stumbling run from the sudden violence, leapt through the window and landed in a crouch, weapons steady, ready... It was empty.

She rose slowly to a standing position, sweeping back and forth for any clues, noting the scratches of claw marks on the stone floor and fragments of carpet left. Sharp brown eyes traced them as her chestnut hair hung behind her, shifting over her shoulder in a loose tail held at the base of her skull... The Demon had gone upstairs, up into the shattered upper floors of the building. There were three floors to this building, largely destroyed by shellfire, fire and looting. She didn't need to test the steps and supports to tell for certain that the entire structure was on the point of collapse, but she wouldn't let that stop her. To kill one such as _this_...

She walked slowly and carefully up the stairs to the first floor, one weapon out and aimed, one ready at all times. Her thick black boots protected her feet and lower legs from shrapnel and debris, her grey trousers, cream blouse, black sweater and dark-blue coat covered the rest. She'd been wearing gloves, but she'd taken them off before going into the Bunker to be sure she was at her best. Aside from her firearms she had a nine-inch combat knife in a sheath strapped to her left forearm while a grenade, plus spare ammunition, was stored in her backpack under the Spear of Destiny, beside her supplies and gear. She'd walked and run considerable distances to get here, she'd do the same to get out again. She just hoped she had what she needed to deal with this Demon...

She heard the soft thump of boot on floor somewhere overhead, flattened herself against the wall and froze, trying to prepare for anything. The Rakshasa had to have shifted into its human form for her to be hearing what she had, but why?

"Peek a boo, I see you..." called a woman's voice-from directly ahead of her! Sister Victoria leapt forwards up the stairs at a dead sprint, burst out into the main room of the second floor, Schmeisser blazing-and almost died.

The floor wasn't there, the outer walls were still mainly standing but the centre of the building had been gutted by some massive impact which had dropped the rest of the buildings insides on top of the ground floor roof. The ten-foot fall wouldn't have killed her, but it would have given her opponent the seconds she needed to kill her, so she dropped her Schmeisser and grabbed hold of the doorframes bottom edge one-handed, twisting violently in mid-air. The jerk almost took her shoulder out of the socket but she held on, straining every muscle in her arm as she had to catch her dead weight added to that of her gear and weapons.

_Stupid. Stupid. STUPID!_ she couldn't help but think, even as she straightened and bent her legs to provide herself leverage that would enable her to pull herself back up one-handed. It hurt-

Two hands suddenly grabbed both of hers and lifted her up as though she weighed nothing, to her shock. She found herself face-to-face with a very beautiful woman-whose nature, despite her smile, was given away by vertical black-slit golden irises.

**...Rakshasa...**

Before Sister Victoria could do anything, the woman leaned forwards and kissed her full on the lips, seemingly enjoying it-before she bit down hard on Sister Victoria's lower lip, teeth tearing right through. Sister Victoria screamed in pain and thrashed, legs kicking the woman's legs and lower chest, before the woman threw her away, using her good arm as a lever. The pain was unbelievable as the arm bent in ways nature had never intended, not breaking by some miracle even as she dropped her gun-long before her back and head slammed into stone and concrete, into sharp rubble, before she broke right through that and on into the ground floor.

The impact of falling to the ground floor through the battered first floor roof snapped several ribs and a leg, lacerating flailing arms and hands, ripping her face open as a jagged board edge nearly took out an eye. The landing blasted the air from her lungs and she felt something soft pop inside her chest as the broken ribs cut inside her. A sudden cough sprayed blood everywhere, which answered that question. A lung was punctured, which meant she was going to die... She felt a sticky warmth slowly spreading out beneath her even as she feebly tried to move, soaking into her clothes...

"...Bitch...Demon W_wwk_..." Sister Victoria managed, being forced to stop as blood tried to flood her throat, forcing her to cough again. The Demon, Rakshasa, leapt from the first-floor doorway through the hole in the roof down to her side. She landed with inhuman liquid grace, then knelt down to look Sister Victoria in the eyes.

"True, but you forgot to add evil mass-murdering monster, black hearted bitch, one or two other titles I've earned. A shame, you had potential..." said Rakshasa, the tips of her fingers caressing Sister Victoria's cheek before going on to caress a breast. Sister Victoria couldn't have been more revolted. Men and women lay with each other, never two of one kind together-

Rakshasa's free hand suddenly drove into her ribs, then on into her chest. She couldn't even scream as she felt claws cut into her guts-then her life shrank to nothing as she saw her own heart, dragged almost out of her chest, still beating in the Demon's hand. For a moment, at least, before Rakshasa bit down into it, which meant she missed Sister Victoria's last act.

Sister Victoria's right hand slowly rose, then was momentarily surrounded by a strange shimmer that caught Rakshasa's eyes-before the whole world fell away forever. Redemption Sight, it was the ultimate reward and skill of the Magdalena, both in training and heritage. No one was immune.

The last thing Sister Victoria ever heard made her smile. The Demon woman, Rakshasa, screaming...

_Paris, six months later_

The woman known to a select few as BloodRayne sat at the bar of the _Marseilles_ restaurant, trying to simply stop and think after far too long on her feet and out of her mind, fed a never-ending number of monsters, an awful amount of rich, thick blood, ideas and possibilities which had almost literally torn her mind in half. It was the closest thing to a break she'd had for too many years-and, more disturbingly, she wasn't sure precisely what she was doing or why any longer...

In real terms, since the beginning of WWII in 39', she'd been run ragged all over the world fighting every kind of creature, monster and enemy of the Brimstone Society that could ever even be conceived of. She'd fought, slaughtered, butchered, killed and terrorised her way through a War that had very nearly set the whole world on fire, killed so many living things she didn't dream of anything but blood and the need for more any longer, met and killed a Lover and never, ever seen or even heard of her father, Kagan. She'd committed acts of monstrosity and abomination to stop worse, done things she'd once never even imagined herself capable of to get the job done-and, very recently, come to the conclusion that if the only means she had to define herself by was the amount of slaughter she'd committed, the names she'd destroyed, she _had_ no definition of herself.

Who was she? _What_ was she? She didn't know, not anymore. She didn't know that she ever had, not really. The Dhampir BloodRayne was a weapon of conflict for the Brimstone Society, her...employer? Example? Mentor of-a-sort? But, she'd once been just a young woman called Rayne, a youth searching for answers she'd never quite found. Who was _she_, now? Did she even still exist?

Rayne, BloodRayne, who _was_ she? _What_ was she? In her own mind, what did she do? What really mattered to _her_? Hell, if she wanted to start at the beginning, what was her name? What was her favourite colour?

Suddenly, seated alone in the restaurant with a long, slender glass of dark red wine in her hand, she felt very, very alone in the world...

Trying to distract herself, even though her sole real purpose here was really only taking the time to think things through if she could, she let her senses expand and took in the room around her, let herself sense her own form and body fully. The tall wooden chair didn't have a cushion, so it was almost uncomfortable despite the sculpted design. That, a fact which was almost funny, was the first thing she noticed.

Then there was the slight breeze pulling at her hair, down and loose around her shoulders falling loose down her back as she so rarely wore it. Her hair was a brilliant, flaming bloody red in colour, except for two thick strands of black that fell to either side. Emerald-green eyes shone, almost searing the mind of anyone who met them with a devastatingly effective combination of intelligence and adamantine will, highlighting a creamy-skinned, fine-featured face enhanced by full, bee-stung ruby red lips, a face more than a few men had called strikingly beautiful. Around her neck hung the necklace holding the Brimstone medallion, the symbol of the Society being one she didn't like to dwell on too much these days.

A curvaceous, hard-muscled slender body was hardly concealed by her close-fitting jet-black evening gown, with a design that caressed her curves and highlighted her figure with intent. High heeled black evening shoes would do nothing to help her run, or even move quickly if she needed to, but she was five-eight naturally and the heels raised her to five-ten. Every little helped, since men tended to respect women they had to look up at to look in the eye more in her experience. The fact was, in all likelihood she would be taking someone "home" to her hotel room tonight, she was in the mood. As well as that, the exhaustion a good, rough roll would induce, with any luck, a dreamless sleep that would actually allow her real rest for once. That was her intent, anyway...

The restaurant was open and stocked, with three brick walls and a glass front, the kitchen contained inside, delicious smells drifting out across her sensitive nose as they cooked. Candles placed in some number all about provided a gentle illumination-more than she needed with her eyesight-while well-dressed waiters almost drifted past every customer according to need and want, somehow always there when needed. Tables were pleasantly laid out with pale white tablecloths, big, full candle holders lit in the centre of each table while dark red serviettes were folded around cutlery at every set place.

Nothing the restaurant could fix or do hadn't been fixed or left undone, none of that was the problem. The problem was _people_. The restaurant, designed to seat at least fifty, had only fifteen at best in it. The reason wasn't just willingness to dine out, either, despite the fact no-one could quite believe, even now, that the terrible War and even worse Occupation were both finally, at long last, over. The reason was, really, money, since the French Economy had effectively collapsed under the Vichy regime, which had taken Nazi orders which had as good as led to the destruction of France as a nation. If she wasn't living on the Brimstone Societies coin, she wouldn't have been in the restaurant herself.

Even neighbours who had known each other for decades before the War were no longer talking, the clouds of fear, distrust and hatred sowed by the Nazi's would takes years to dissipate, if they ever did. Things no one spoke of, or even thought of, had been done during the dark, terrible years no one wanted to think about, that few even would, terrible, terrible things. Those who had seen and heard the trains, the screams, knew most of it. Only people like BloodRayne, who wished she didn't, knew the rest.

She sipped her wine-it wasn't even close to being blood, but it was strong-flavoured, which helped-and shook her head. Paris was the city of romance, freedom, possibility and chance-or so she'd always heard, in her brief visits during and before the War when she'd been passing through on her way to somewhere else, often at some speed. She'd talked to people who'd known Paris for decades-even centuries, although that was a secret she didn't discuss-so it had seemed a very good idea when she'd decided on her Holiday. Now? Now, she was discovering that she hadn't thought it through, again, a reflection of the fact that, except in a fight, she rarely thought any distance ahead. Paris was still a battered, scarred and wounded survivor of the War now, but given a few years it would recover, cities like it always did. She should have asked to go to New York, even though she'd only been there once and...Well, the Society didn't know what had actually happened there. She could have even have gotten back in touch with Henry...

She heard the door open and looked around, although not too sharply since she didn't want to draw attention to herself. Her eyes widened, this was interesting...

Dark-brown eagles eyes, sharp and penetrating as steel in flesh. Ice blond hair that fell loose to her waist, thick and silky. A body worth killing for, long-limbed and hard-muscled, topped by the kind of fine-featured beauty that would have made a Renaissance artist weep. Graceful and elegant in a sense better imagined than described, all surrounded by a deep blue silk dress that was cut low enough at the front to reveal a hint of cleavage. Not a hint of hesitation, not a tremor in her step, she didn't even seem to bother looking around the room before striding over to a chair almost within touching distance of Rayne herself, where she sat smoothly, tossing long hair over her shoulder, strands attractively framing her face.

An assured beauty backed by a strong, assured intellect, Rayne could tell. Just like she could tell something _else_: the woman wasn't completely human, if she ever had been that. Too much in the way of sharp edges, hard areas and an ugly, almost threatening stink-at least to her nose-that reminded her of Werewolves in the form of traces of damp fur stench and blood only almost hidden by the wind and pelt scent. Too warm, too, Rayne's senses were being set off by inhuman body heat that had to make the woman uncomfortable at a bar designed for humans at the very least, as well as traces of other, worse things, but that was where things got..._odd_.

She wasn't a Werewolf, Rayne knew all of the signs for those, a plus of having killed so many over the years was you learnt what to look for. She wasn't a Vampire, the steady heartbeat and body heat made that obvious-which meant something else. She didn't have a mental encyclopaedia of every form of monster, Demon and supernatural creature in the known and unknown worlds, she looked that sort of thing up in the Brimstone Archives every time, but she knew she didn't know just what she was dealing with here...

"Whiskey, straight up, large glass. In fact, leave the bottle" ordered the woman, voice like sweetness and sex to the ears, a bedroom voice if ever she'd heard one. As she said it Rayne's nose finally sorted through the scents she'd been absorbing and realised something new. Alcohol, it was a very strong stink all over the woman and in her breath. Just how much had she had to drink? She didn't _seem_ drunk, but with some that was impossible anyway...

The Waiter served her without question, evidently recognising her, passing out a large glass full of Whiskey and the rest of the bottle. She paused a moment, looked around-her gaze seemed to pause on Rayne for a second-spotted one of the more attractive young men and raised her glass to him, before tossing the whole glass back, fast. Rayne blinked, if there was any physical humanity left in there at all then that was _not_ a good idea...

"You remind me of me, but I don't think its for the same reasons, Red. Want to talk about it?" said the woman, abruptly. Rayne blinked, thought about it-then moved to the chair next to the woman. What the Hell, she was off-duty...

"I'll trade you this. You answer mine, I'll answer yours, fair?" said Rayne, settling down next to the woman.

"Fine, although you may not like the answer, "Brimstone"" replied the woman, with a deliberate glance at Rayne's medallion. Rayne felt a momentary flash of irritation, but forced it down.

"My names Rayne, I _work_ for the Brimstone Society, they don't _own_ me. How about _you_?" replied Rayne, almost snapping at the other woman.

"The Society doesn't have that kind of wealth, I'm done with causes after what I saw it all come to in Berlin in 45'. To answer your question, though, I was an archaeologist during the War and an Explorer before that, I've had several "employers" over the years. My turn. I was born September 23rd 1901, India, to Audrey Masaville and Togoth, a Rakshasa Demon. My mothers husband was Father Paul Masaville, he and my mother were Missionaries. You?" asked the woman.

"January 3rd 1913, the USA, New Orleans. My fathers name was...is...Kagan...he ...seduced...my mother, Monica Derayne. My turn...what's your name?" replied Rayne. Even as she spoke, she couldn't quite believe just how easily she was discussing these things. She _never_, _ever_ discussed her personal history, so what was she _doing_ here?

"Rakshasa, my friends call me Rak, very few people get to call me Audrey. What about you? Do you mean _the_ Kagan?" replied Rakshasa, raising an eyebrow as she stared at Rayne intently. Rayne didn't like the look on her face...

"BloodRayne, my friends call me Rayne... What do you mean, _the_ Kagan?" replied Rayne, meeting Rakshasa's eyes dead on. Rakshasa just smiled.

"I told you...I was on my way out of India in 20' when I met him. He was handsome, dangerous and brilliant, knew exactly what he wanted and how to get it. Do you want me to go on?" asked Rakshasa, smirking.

"NO! Yuck..." muttered Rayne, disgusted, before she spotted Rakshasa's eyes lift and track something outside the restaurant. Rakshasa's expression changed suddenly, from a slightly depressed, almost teasing look to one of dead seriousness.

"Rayne...are they with you?" asked Rakshasa, slowly. Rayne turned herself, to see half a dozen shadowed figures-_armed_ figures-just standing around outside the restaurant windows and doors in the darkness. They weren't moving, not even shifting from foot to foot-they weren't breathing, either. The dozen figures standing across the road were even worse. Rayne's eyesight let her make out the fact that some of them were missing body parts-hands, arms, even parts of skulls. They all had injuries, fatal injuries, one had had half of its skull caved in, a second its chest crushed, a third had been completely disembowelled and was walking around with shrivelled, rotting red-grey intestines and organs in full view. All of them were dressed in the rotting remnants of uniforms of some sort...

Vampires. Zombies. A lot of them, in post-War Paris, outside a restaurant she happened to be in, effectively alone. If this was coincidence she was ten feet tall, bright green and lived underwater... "No" she said, quietly, even as the other occupants of the restaurant began to notice the figures outside, which made them shift and stir nervously...

"**_RRRAAAYYNNNEEE!_**" bellowed one of the Vampires, the central, tallest one. Long dark hair falling to his shoulders, long, handsome face, dressed in brown leathers and chain mail. A big man, armed with a Longsword, chain-mail shirt and shield by the look of it. Typical Vampire thinking regarding fighting up to date, Rayne thought. The others all had similar armaments and armour, although the Zombies were unarmed. Of course, given that nothing but smashing or tearing them to pieces would permanently stop them, that wasn't really much help...

"Definitely not, no one I know would try to kill without using a gun or trying to bite me when I'm not looking, everyone I've met whose survived knows better. You?" asked Rayne.

"People who try to kill me don't survive the experience, flippancy will be more appropriate if we live by the way. Are you armed?" replied Rakshasa, pushing her chair back and standing up.

"No, but I'll make do with theirs" replied Rayne, letting her lips part to show her extended fangs since the Waiters were all staring out of the windows at the figures outside-the Vampires all charged at once. Yet again, Rayne reflected, anyone who believed that Vampires couldn't enter an abode uninvited and tried to convince others of that should be hung, drawn and quartered...

Things suddenly happened very fast.

The charging Vampires smashed through the glass front of the restaurant and ran inside as though the shattered glass was nothing, smashing anything in their way out of it with blade, boot and fist as necessary. Blood exploded from wounds, spraying walls, floor and ceiling, body parts were flung aside and around like nothing, screaming started and hit such a pitch within seconds Rayne's super-sensitive hearing almost made her go deaf.

Rakshasa's body seemed to fall in on itself before exploding outwards into a monstrous, huge black shape that slammed into the charging Vampires and smashed four of them flat before they knew what had hit them. Rayne barely had time to take in the sight of a six-foot long eight hundred pound jet-black Panther with huge, black eyes illuminated by vertical gold slits and what appeared to be sharp ridges of hard bone erupting out of its back before the screaming intensified to an impossible pitch, nine-inch claws flicking out of the Panthers paws to cut the nearest Vampire in half right across the chest, the hideously wounded Vampire falling to the floor in two pieces soaked in an instant by a massive pool of its own blood. It reared out of the tangle and bit down on a second Vampires head so hard that a vigorous shake and wrench decapitated the creature, the ruined body instantly starting to burn. A third Vampire stabbed the Panther in the chest with a dagger while the fourth was pinned down momentarily by the massive weight atop it.

The leader and his remaining soldier jumped past the Panther and came after her directly. She grabbed her chair and threw it at the leader, who smashed it aside with his shield, before back flipping onto the bar and grabbing Rakshasa's discarded bottle of whiskey. Rolling in a perfectly timed sideways flip she expertly dodged the leaders slashing sword and blocked the second Vampires attack by smashing the bottle in his face.

Even as he reeled backwards, alcohol in his eyes and glass in his face, she grabbed the nearest lit candle and threw it like a throwing knife so hard it stuck in his forehead and knocked him off his feet. His face caught fire, a fire which quickly reached down his neck and began to spread. His screams of agony came from places so deep inside the sounds didn't belong on Earth.

The leader came at her again, this time so hard that his strike shattered the bar from top to bottom, cleaving through thick wood backed by steel even as she jumped backwards out of the way. She quickly spotted an army rifle under the bar-and a bayonet hung in a safety sheath beside it. She just hoped she'd have time to grab it...

Rakshasa, deep into her feral, savage nature as the truth of the beast, didn't even notice the dagger strike which struck into her breastbone and stopped dead, wedged by massive, hard muscle and thick, solid bone. She slammed a paw down onto the Vampires head as hard as she could, smashing his head into wooden floor hard enough to mangle and smash his skull even as her claws shredded meat, bone and brain. Even that wasn't enough to kill a Vampire-but she let go as the last Vampire wrenched free and drew back his battleaxe. They both attacked at the same time, but her slashing attack took his face off as well shattering the haft of the axe before he could strike, the blade falling on his head and cutting right down to his shoulders.

She bit its head off and spat it out, the body instantly starting to burn, before turning to see how Rayne was doing. The answer was a shock...

Rayne grabbed the rifle and just got clear before the Vampire nearly shattered the bar with a stroke of massive physical strength. She rolled frantically sideways, snatching the bayonet from the floor, flinging the sheath away before screwing the bayonet onto the rifle even as she jumped to her feet and back, the big Vampire literally tearing the bar right out of the ground to get at her.

Finally ready, she advanced her weapon-then attacked, hard and fast. The rifle was steel-bound hard wood, but his sword was solid sharp steel and he was clearly strong enough to bend steel in his bare hands. She just hoped that it was enough...

High stab, low slash, spinning kick, feint and nick the shield as a shadow strike-he was good, _too_ good to be easily overcome. She was sure she could take him, though-right up to the moment when she slipped on a patch of spilt alcohol and lost her footing. He didn't hesitate, blink or even question his chance, within a breath his sword lanced forwards and pierced her ribcage, her chest entirely, collapsing a lung and nicking her spine as it punched out of her back with such force behind the blade that the sword was buried in the wall behind her deep and hard enough to keep her on her feet.

If a strike like that had hit her heart, as she suspected he'd intended, it wasn't impossible that she would have suffered True Death. Her awful scream, torn from the depths of her guts so deep inside that it seemed far away from her, let her know that the possibility wasn't so far away at all at that moment...

"Don't make this harder than it has to be, BloodRayne" he hissed in her ear, voice hard and sharp, feral and savage. He reached up and tore away the top of her dress, baring her breasts, before his fangs fell and he bit deeply into her left breast. Feeling her blood forcibly drawn in a form of Vampiric Rape, Rayne's screamed redoubled even as she fought with every ounce of physical and mental strength she had left to get loose, beating her attacker around chest, shoulders and legs, but he was as solid and steady as rock. It was no good, she was going into shock from the massive injury, the horrendous loss of blood was only making matters worse, fast. Her body wasn't healing, wasn't even trying, her life, her strength were literally draining right out of her, _being_ drained right out of her-

The Vampire suddenly let go of her, wrenched the sword right out of her and span around to put his own back to the wall, his swords edge across her throat. If he hadn't held her up, she would have simply collapsed, her eyesight was fading in and out-but it was still enough for her to see that, of her-their-attackers, the only survivor was the leader. The burned Vampire was starting break apart, his heart cooked and destroyed, all four of the attackers Rakshasa had tackled were destroyed, mere piles of smouldering ashes on the floor... Sobbing people, mere mortals, were still scattered everywhere, all hurt, she dimly registered.

All Rayne could think was that Rakshasa hadn't been so much as hinting at what she was capable of when she said no one survived trying to kill her. Four armed Vampires shredded and dead in less than five minutes? At her best, Rayne would have been hard- pressed to beat that, even to match it.

Rakshasa's body fell in on itself again, the knife falling to the floor with a thump stained with blood and, when she stood up straight, the woman Rayne had met stood there again, right down to perfectly settled evening gown, an almost-healed small cut evident just atop her dress in her chest. It was almost enough to make her blink, or laugh if she'd had the strength left. As it was, she could feel blood running from between her lips out of her mouth, feel the too-fast loss of blood out of her massive chest injury, feel her body starting to go cold. She was...dying? She was an Agent of the Brimstone Society, a Dhampir-a woman who had far too much left to see and do in the world, far too much _life_ left to her. She couldn't die like _this_...

"She's dead anyway, Werewoman, let her die and nothing more has to happen here and now. Don't...I'll kill you too" snarled the Vampire, slowly.

"Let me make something clear for you, Vampire. I can think of a dozen ways to kill you before you can move, I can think of a thousand ways to make you suffer, worse things than you could ever imagine in a thousand years. I can do anything at all I want to you faster than you can think, let alone move. I know what your going to do before you do it because I can read your mind, your body language and your eyes. If I wanted to badly enough I could make you pluck out your eyes and hand them to me. I can and will do these things to you, because you mean _nothing_ to me. _She_, though, is going to live a while yet, so to save her life I'll make you a deal. Are you following me so far?" asked Rakshasa, staring straight at the Vampire.

"...Yes" replied the Vampire, after a moment, clearly trying to decide whether or not Rakshasa was serious. By the tone of voice and sudden tremble of his hand, he'd quickly realised that she was as serious as death itself. Rayne, again, wondered who she was to get through to even Vampires like this...?

"Good, because this is a one-time offer. Me for her. Take _my_ blood and leave her as she is, live or die. You can smell it, I know you can, you can taste the power and the strength in me if you've any talent at all. You can take what I have and become some little part of what I am. Do you understand? With my strength you can survive your Masters anger and you know it... Come along, I won't fight" said Rakshasa, shifting her head to one side to bare her throat.

The Vampire lost it, threw Rayne to the floor and leapt on Rakshasa, staggering her. His fangs cut deep into her flesh, almost to the bone, he ripped and tore at her throat, opening up the wound to make the blood flow quickly. When it did it was phenomenal, warmth and life and pure, unadulterated power being drawn straight into him. He was almost overwhelmed, before he realised that something was terribly wrong as it started in his throat, his belly...

Rayne didn't understand what was happening when the Vampire suddenly jerked away from Rakshasa's neck, Rakshasa immediately slapping a hand over the wound. The Vampire staggered backwards, seemingly choking, coughing-then he erupted in a sheet of unearthly black fire, a momentary howl of animal pain rising to an impossible pitch before simply ending as he disappeared, not even ashes being left...

Rayne, shaking and shivering in terrible pain, managed to look straight at Rakshasa again. Black, tar-like blood was running down her neck over her shoulder, running over and around her hand where it stuck, on skin and silk. Nothing remotely human had blood like that, not anything like that. What _was_ this woman, for pities sake?

"Demon blood, idiot. Tasted good, didn't it?" said Rakshasa, even as Rayne dimly registered the fact that drops of Rakshasa's blood were burning small holes in the floor beside her. That was before Rakshasa's eyes came around to meet hers-and the woman winked as she removed the hand from the wound in her throat. The wound was already almost completely healed...

"Hold on, Rayne..." said Rakshasa, looking around sharply and sniffing the air. She abruptly leapt over to where a mortal man's body was lying under a table, one arm ripped clean away at the shoulder, landing in a crouch with the same animal grace she'd displayed in her Panther form. She tossed the table away one-handed as though it was made of paper, picked up the man and leapt back over to Rayne. He was still alive, even Rayne's failing senses could tell that, but just barely. He was bleeding slowly from his ruined shoulder, but that wasn't what was killing him. His heartbeat was slow and erratic, his breathing was too fast and shallow, his eyes were glassy. He was in deep Shock and that, added to the pain of his injuries, was shutting down his body. He was dying because nobody knew how to save him...

"Rayne, he's dead anyway so I need you to listen. Well, actually, I need to ask you something. Don't hate me for this?" said Rakshasa, even as she carefully manoeuvred the man over Rayne's prone form.

Rayne suddenly knew what was coming... She didn't want this, she couldn't _do_ this. _No_... She couldn't even speak to say something, couldn't move even a finger...

Rakshasa manoeuvred the mans throat over the slumped Rayne's mouth-then tore his throat out with her claws. Blood literally drenched Rayne's head and face, splashed across her chest-but most, by far, flowed into her mouth and down her throat, from where it reached her stomach and spread out into the rest of her body. Her barely beating heart suddenly beat so hard and fast that she halfway imagined it would crack a rib before, unable to stop herself as her Vampiric nature overwhelmed her weakened rational mind, she dragged herself up and sank her fangs deep into the dying man's throat. The flow, if anything, only increased and became all the sweeter-

Despite her needs, despite her base desires, an appalling effort of Will finally freed her from slavery to a part of her nature she didn't want to know more about. She managed to retract her fangs and dragged herself free from the mans throat, almost choking, before flailing hands and kicking feet found purchase, digging into walls and scraping against the floor. She dragged herself free and to her knees, crawled clear before scrambling halfway to her feet-then screamed, so long, loud and horrible that she almost couldn't imagine that that awful noise was her...

"Rayne, calm down-" came Rakshasa's voice from behind her, a hand gently settling on her shoulder-Rayne span and punched Rakshasa full in the face as hard as she could, not stopping to think that striking a being who had just slaughtered four armed and armoured Vampires right in front of her before saving her life might not be at all wise. The force of the blow, with all of Rayne's considerable strength behind it, would have killed any human, most Vampires would have been staggered by it at least. Rakshasa's head barely moved as Rayne's fist landed on her nose, only for a trickle of blood to issue from her left nostril.

She reached up slowly and wiped it away-before a hand full of sharpened claws was suddenly around Rayne's neck with an awful strength behind it Rayne knew she couldn't hope to match. "Rayne, because I like you, you get _one_ shot. Not ever again though, clear? Or I'll take your skin off with the edge of a diamond and dissolve your thumbs in acid. Now, I think we need to go? We can call these people help from safety" said Rakshasa, looking meaningfully at the injured and still terrified surviving mortals-who would realise that they were safe in moments at best.

Much as Rayne hated to admit it, Rakshasa was right. She was no Doctor or Surgeon, which was what these people needed. More to the point, after what they'd just seen here... Rayne glanced outside at the still immobile Zombies, confused. "First, I _do not_ drink human blood unless its life or death, so don't ever force-feed me again unless it's a similar situation. Second, what about them?" she asked, pointing.

Rakshasa glanced at her, then turned, spread both arms to encompass all of the Zombies and spoke a set of very specific words that Rayne didn't need to be told were a Spell as the words seemed to cut into her brain, grate in her ears, pull at her mind. Nothing happened for a moment...then a Zombie collapsed and fell to dust and pieces, followed by another, another. Finally, by all of them.

All Rayne could do was blink, then simply say "Wow" as she watched the spectacle. She knew enough about Mysticism and the arcane to be sure that raising even a single Undead, even a mindless husk like a Zombie, was not something undertaken lightly. It required considerable power to penetrate the Veil that separated life and death, so the raising of a number of Undead required a Mage of considerable power, maybe even a Sorcerer. To cut those kind of ties so cleanly _also_ required both considerable skill and power. She looked at Rakshasa with a very slight sense of respect and maybe a trace of fear. She _really_ needed to find out more about this woman, this...Demon? She'd mentioned Demon Blood, what did that _mean_ anyway?

"Done. Shall we go now? I would rather be gone far before they turn up with Pitchforks, Stakes and torches myself" said Rakshasa, this time simply starting to walk out of the restaurant. Rayne, still a little weak from her healing injuries and blood loss, tried to pull up the front of her dress and took a moment to compose herself before walking after Rakshasa slowly and carefully, gaining strength and confidence as she moved...

She stopped, surprised as Rakshasa turned around abruptly, an odd look on her face. Rakshasa raised her right hand and placed it on Rayne's wounded breast, the gesture an unmistakable caress. Rayne shivered, should have slapped the hand away, told the woman she had no interest in that. She didn't, even as the hand moved to the other breast before ending up over Rayne's heart, smooth, silky skin, warm, perfect and gentle, making the pain she was suffering all fade away to nothing. Rayne could feel her heartbeat against that hand, feel the steady pulse in Rakshasa's own body...

Rakshasa leaned into her and placed a tender kiss on her lips, the kind of heat erupting from that brush of contact which made Rayne almost wish they were alone and safe right now. _Almost_. She liked it rough and there was no question Rakshasa could play both very rough and very passionate, none at all... The fact that her one and only real Lover before now-she'd had plenty of flings, her life got very lonely sometimes and men could be very willing when confronted with a willing woman like her-had been a man, even though he'd ended up betraying and being slaughtered by her, was barely enough. After all, it wasn't as though she'd never considered it...

"_Later_. Lets go" said Rakshasa, with the slightest of smiles. With that, she turned and ran off at a steady, loping run. Rayne, having managed to secure the top of her dress again at last, followed. She really did hope that this woman was everything she seemed...just what did she really mean by that, though?

_Unknown location_

The tall, dark-haired and eyed man smiled, his strikingly handsome features shifting attractively to highlight high cheekbones. His black hair fell in a lion's mane to his white shirt collar while his deep, dark brown eyes sparkled with intelligence, glinting with a trace of an truly ugly darkness barely hidden beneath the surface. His shirt was open down the front, close-fitting black trousers and his bare chest outlining hard, defined muscle and a dark, if oddly almost pale, skin. Bare feet settled on the cool stone floor of his chamber, allowing him to easily count every separate scrap of silica underfoot with his heightened senses. He was Kagan, titled the Master Vampire-and he was immensely enjoying what he was seeing and hearing now.

In the broad chamber, spreading twenty feet in all directions, a massive Kings bed sat to the rear area, far away from the broad single entrance. Old banners, ancient weapons of all descriptions and a massive variety of trophies and paraphernalia no one else understood the meaning of lay everywhere about, bar on the bed itself. In the centre of the chamber a massive fire pit had been dug out of the floor that flooded the entire chamber with heat and light when lit, as it was now.

The fire pit was also Kagan's centre and focus of power, dug into one of the few places on the Earth where Lay Lines converged to form and focus massive energies, if one knew how. Kagan did, so the creation and construction involved had only made sense. At this moment he was watching, through a window in space and time a spell had created which a thought maintained, his favourite child-not that she'd ever know-slaughter yet more of his minions, sent to turn her, not kill her, of course.

Ah, the strength, the skill she displayed, the powers she took in she didn't even know she had. He'd been disappointed to notice the Rakshasa Demons presence, let alone its interference, but he could sense, smell and see a heart blacker than the Devil's own hand beating in that one's chest. Rayne would have killed them all anyway, of course, she always found a way, but, with the formidable, powerful Demon woman by her side, especially with the bond they already shared which would likely only strengthen over time... He could see and sense all manner and matter of opportunities there.

_BloodRayne_. Why hadn't he paid more attention when, as no more than a girl, she'd started slaughtering her way towards him in America and then on through Europe, before being captured by the Police, only to be taken and trained by the Brimstone Society? Simple. Despite her evident talent, he had many children and he'd arrogantly believed that no half-caste bitch would ever amount to anything, truly. His arrogance, then, would have swamped entire worlds. Now he knew better, had been taught better, had learnt better. BloodRayne was more special and truly unique than she so much as possibly guessed at, even the Brimstone Society didn't realise what he knew now for a fact...

Sweet times were coming, a War, new worlds and bright horizons turned red with sweet blood, black with the fires of Hell. BloodRayne was the key, whether she knew it or not...

"Hmf...Kagan? Watching her again? I appreciate your reasons and understand your concerns, but believe me, you have to wait. All good things and everything great comes to the patient in time" said his lovers voice from behind him, even as she walked up to stand next to him. She was belting on a jade-green robe that fell easily to her feet, but he still caught glimpses of deep, full curves and flawless skin, smooth, creamy flesh. He looked up at her face-and was caught cold, again, by those impossible eyes, an uncanny mix of emerald and jade green but truly neither, instead some mesmerising, impossible mixture of colour and possibility that could never be imagined. Long, ravens wing jet black hair fell easily to her waist loose and down even as he watched...

It was said that Angels were created of perfection, forged into perfection and brought to perfection through the Will of God himself. Male and female, they were gifts made and granted by an absolute which could not create any less than an impossible possibility of humanities perfection clothed in the flesh and blood of mortals made and sustained by Gods divine Will. What that made the Devil, he couldn't even begin to guess at. What that made the thing of luxury and possibility, fantasy and imagination, perfection given firm and full form standing by him now? His mind wasn't intended to handle or imagine concepts of that nature. He didn't care.

She said her name was **_Lilith_**, creator of the Lilim, mother of Cain, origin of their entire race...

"Besides" she continued, not looking at him or even paying him the slightest trace of attention, "I've been waiting for this since before that slut Eve's children crawled out of the oceans the first time. I've been thinking about this since before the Fall, when I spoke of possibilities and chances with Samael, made plans and passed thoughts which came to nothing. My children built up the Silver City only to be claimed by the hundred on the Word of God? For _my_ actions? The sins were his and hers, none of mine. Damn them _all_..." spat out Lilith, before pausing for a moment. Slowly, she smiled again.

"_Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn..._" she called out to the air, as though reaching out to something...

_Brimstone Manor_

"So the Lords of Brimstone welcome a brother into their ranks and ask of him only _this_: that he help us fight evil and atrocity wherever and whenever it be found, with all the strength of his body, mind and will. It is our destiny. So say all. _Aye_" said the tall old man, face and body hidden beneath a blood-red robe touched on the outside of the hood by streaks of silver, the only markings of his rank. If asked, all present would only have said that he was the first among equals.

"_Aye_" repeated all of the Brimstone Lords assembled in the closed, broad central hall of Brimstone Manor, every man dressed in the same dark, bloody red robe that hid every feature. The word was spoken by forty-nine voices, the fiftieth man there being finally introduced to the fold. The sound of the words echoed around the solid stone chamber, echoing from dark wooden boards and timbers that made up the fronting of the walls and the structure of the roof. It almost seemed a minute later before the word died away again.

The lone man stepped forwards to the centre of the room, to be surrounded by all of his fellow Lords. He spread his arms wide and spoke to them all at once.

"God has abandoned us here on this world he made for us we share with monster, mockery and obscenity. He no longer cares or acts in our favour or against, so we must act ourselves. The truth is life and light, the lie is darkness and the foul forgotten knowledge of this world which _must_ be lost forever and more. We fight for our future and that of our children, our children's children and more. This is a War, we only win or die. For myself, I choose to _fight_. Join me, Lords of Brimstone, as I join _you_ in this great and final struggle for the truth of history itself" said the man, before being handed a simple wooden goblet full of some slick, liquid substance, dark red and thick in nature. He knew what it was, he didn't care.

All of the other Lords raised their own goblets, passed out from a table near the door, then drank with him as he swallowed deep and long until it all was gone. _Blood_, thick and sweet and pure and true, the one part in ten that renewed and restored...

The first Lord to speak reached up and removed his hood, revealing the face of a man in his late sixties with iron-grey hair cut right down to the scalp, ice-cold arctic-blue eyes and an aquiline, aristocratic face of fine features. His eyes and features were cool, cold and almost empty of even emotion, but the slight smile that creased his worn lips was genuine and real to the eye.

The new Lord removed his own hood, revealing a still hard middle-aged face. His eyes were slate grey, harder than granite and sharper than any diamonds edge, while his hair, in his mid fifties, was still jet-black, if thinning. His face had never been handsome, but now it was so utterly devoid of expression that, despite its soft edges and easy shape, few could ever look at him and see even humanity in the man. He'd been a gentle man once, incapable of hurting even a fly and willing to forgive any Sin with Penance and Absolution given true. He'd have done anything for anyone and given his life in service without a thought. He would still do the latter, but for an entirely different cause now, for very different reasons.

"Welcome, Jacob Matthews, most welcome and be known to all. A little different to the Church, isn't it?" said the first Lord, looking Matthews in the eyes. Matthews didn't pause or even blink.

"God is dead and gone, Lord Cordover. Faith is nothing without belief, possibility is nothing without action. I saw the bodies opened and burning, I heard them all die and I stopped believing that there was such a thing as Sin in mans heart and Soul. Evil is a thing of Creation which must be fought by Good and free Will. That is who I am, the Church is a forgotten nothing, a tragedy created from past mistakes. I only hope I can aid our cause in whatever way is necessary" replied Matthews, not once showing the slightest sign of any emotion, not in his eyes or about his face.

Lord Cordover just smiled...

_**The End...of the beginning.**_

_**To be continued in:**_

**THE BLOODLINE WARS.**


	2. Chapter 2

Legal disclaimers: Do I really need to point out that I do not own or lay claim to BloodRayne and anything directly connected to her world, again? In this case I am not trying to pretend that I wrote historical classics, either, Circe as a character/myth goes back to ancient Greek mythology. Everything original to this story I do lay claim to, however.

Disclaimers: This is the first part of several short stories connected to my original story, introducing key characters for what is to come. Second time around, consider this mature readers preferred for reasons such as the story being set immediately after WWII. I know that its been most of three years since I updated this story, people, but you'd be amazed-and in some cases not, I'm sure-at what real life can invent to eat up your time. Again, all comments/reviews welcomed, including flames.

**Alliance**

_Ithaca, Greece, 1945_

The warmth of the wind blowing off of the sea over her was pleasing, in a way that reminded her of days long gone and centuries passed. The sea itself caressed her bare feet and her lower legs as she stood just off shore, washing against her skin in a gentle way that reminded her of a lovers touch.

She hadn't known a lovers touch in over a hundred years, some grubby little mortal she had allowed into her bed to..._ease_ herself on every so often over the past few decades most assuredly did not assuage her need for a familiarity only an Immortal could know. That was why she'd found herself here, she supposed, trying to draw back the Veil of ancient times and recapture some little of what she had known of the Age of Hero's, remind herself of the life and love she'd known all those years ago. That was why she'd come to old Odysseus's home, in fact, her lover then, when she'd been little more than a child herself.

The place was doing what she wanted it to do, take her away from herself for a while and let her believe that the world was the simple, honest place she'd always wanted it to be. The memories, though, were not so easy to draw forth. Still, she _was_ over 3,100 years old now, maybe she should have expected it?

She cast her mind out instead of trying to focus it and let herself drift, feeling the sea wind lift and shift her ruby-red curls across her shoulders, back and chest. Her eyes, a deep violet that had startled every human who'd ever made the mistake of meeting her gaze, were hidden behind closed eyelids, but she could feel the golden orb in the sky people called the sun moving across the cloudless, pure blue of the brilliant summers day. Its light and heat were reaching down from so far away to illuminate every part of her body, to tan olive-brown skin a dusky gold.

She sometimes wondered if her father, Helios-or Apollo, as he sometimes preferred-would ever change his routine, even just to see what the reaction of the mortals would be. She suspected not, since he had been charged by Zeus with the duty he kept so faithfully. Of course, he wasn't the _only_ Sun God...

Just an inch below six feet tall in height, with a physique an Amazon of old would have been proud of and the kind of, literally, divine beauty that had driven sculptors to attempt to capture the impossible for longer than she'd been alive. Her Aunt, Aphrodite, had told her some stories about that-but she was human in appearance, although half Divine in nature. The fact that she stood in the sea naked would have driven any artist to insanity.

She was a Demi-God, as they had said in the Age of Hero's, daughter of the God Helios and the Oceanid Perse. She was perfection crafted of perfection made of something more, a fragment of possibility and indistinct perception given form and life. Her name was Circe-and today, she almost felt old.

It was nothing to do with the issue she knew for a fact she was one of only half a dozen pieces of those of Olympus placed on this world _left_ in this world. No, because an Immortal who became lonely was halfway to madness and death. What she wanted, _needed_ was a purpose. Not the obscenity the Nazi's had dangled before her during the recent War, either.

Olympus and Heaven had no issue with each other. More to the point, she rather liked the way Yahweh's Disciples were willing to die, as his son had been, to make those who came after understand the truth of the message they had been trying to teach the still brutal, savage humanity. That spoke of true courage which, as a warrior herself, she would always respect.

The offer to make Blood Sacrifice of every one of the Jews in their camps to her in return for her help against the Allies had almost turned her stomach, despite everything. Whoever had made the offer had to have know what a temptation it would be, since there was very little more powerful than the recently released life energies of a strong, devout Soul channelled directly to a Mage through a binding ritual using the Sacrifices own blood. But, she hadn't even attempted such an action since the Middle Ages, when Witches had sacrificed to her to gain her Favour.

Why was very simple: she'd become so glutted on power, so addicted to the flow of stolen life into her veins, that it had driven her Insane. During that time, her Gifts to some had made possible spells and actions that the human mind was never intended to comprehend, let alone successfully cast-and so her insanity had spread. She'd recovered, eventually, but her actions had led to the literal Witch Hunts when madmen with the Blessing of the Church had hunted down and slaughtered every Practitioner they could find-and many more women who had no skill for magic at all.

She hadn't felt guilty, what did she care about mortal madness? They were sacrificing to a being who was almost a God, they should have considered whether she was benign or not before asking for favours or receiving her gifts. But it had taught her a valuable lesson: mortals _could_ damage and maybe even destroy her, whether or not she wanted to believe it.

Still, turning her visitors into Pigs and Teleporting them straight into Hitler's Berlin headquarters hadn't seemed much more than a fair way of saying "No" to her. The GGG troops sent to kill her in reprisal...well, that had been an irritation more than anything else. She'd Teleported them back to Jurgen Wulf, in several increasingly small pieces, to be sure that he understood her point. They'd left her alone after that.

The sands she was standing on were golden, free of the muck "modern" man so liked, it seemed to her, since they dropped it over everything. The sea was clean and clear, the trees not so far behind her up beyond the beach in full leaf, tall and green and strong. She was alone for miles, asides from her chosen company, in the closest thing to a Paradise this world had left for her.

But...she was bored, _that_ was what had been bothering her. She wasn't lonely, or depressed. She was simply bored and, after all the destruction caused during the War, there was little left she could casually do to alleviate the fact. Well, not without attracting the wrong kind of attention anyway...

...Why was everything dark so suddenly? She extended her Mystic senses and realised that nothing had changed, outwardly. Someone was trying to reach out to her, mind to mind, so her mind had automatically withdrawn from contact and now rested securely behind a natural defence created by the very aura of her power. It was no exaggeration for her to state that it would take a God to breach her natural defences, which tended to kill anyone who touched them just because that was what she wanted, so whoever was reaching out to her was foolish, desperate-or knew exactly what they were doing.

On impulse, she allowed the contact and sensed that it was only a moderately powerful entity who wished to make contact with her. A very powerful Vrykolakas, or Vampire, depending on which culture you cared to refer to. No danger to her existed from such a source, so she allowed the contact to deepen.

An image formed before her minds eye, about six feet tall, long dark black hair with leonine beard and moustache, a physically powerful figure with the solid muscle to match. Handsome, in a sense, if one cared to put up with the pale skin and the fact that he would drink your blood without invitation if he got hungry enough. He wore black leggings, black boots and a pale white shirt that suited him well. Despite the elegance of his dress and his good looks, however, there was something...undeniably _male_ about him. An almost _savage_ masculinity?

She liked what she saw, which didn't happen very often. This one was a figure of power and strength, through and through, there was no pretence about him. It was almost a shame they weren't meeting in the flesh.

Given the aura of power and strength she could sense about him, she made an educated guess at his age being about 2,000 years. Vrykolakas which made it past their first 500 years tended to be the most powerful, ruthless and cunning of their kind and, the longer they survived, the stronger and powerful they became.

The odds against their survival past the first millennium were barely worth mentioning, since Vrykolakas as a breed were natural animal killers who more often than not lost their minds within a century of the change, unable to cope with the shift from Mortality to Immortality. Those who didn't had to fight tooth and nail just to survive, but if they did? Well, to make it to a thousand years practically made them unique in Vrykolakas circles. To survive as long as this one had and still have an intact mind? This was something almost new even to her. She liked that, too.

"Milday, I bow before you and ask that you hear my words and my thoughts. But ask me to leave and I will, as you wish it" began the man.

"Rise and be welcome in my presence, Vrykolakas. Name yourself, I wish to know to whom I speak" she replied, a touch of ritual slipping into her speech. Given that many of the spells she used required spoken words as a key part of components required, though, she was used to that.

"Milady, I name myself as the Vrykolakas Kagan. I ask if I may speak?" replied Kagan.

"Granted, freely, your presence and your words intrigue me. I await you" she replied, her hands on her hips in reality. He would see what he saw in this Vision, modesty was an issue Mortals suffered.

"My thanks. Milady Circe, I seek to build an army of great force and power, one capable of and intent on overthrowing the world of human kind forever. This task was begun six years ago and is almost completed this day, but for some few key elements remain. I come to you for this" Kagan said, before pausing to hear her response.

"I see. Continue and say what you will" responded Circe. Despite herself, she was finding what the Vrykolakas was talking about interesting. Maybe she'd been more bored than she realised?

"My army is made from and of those like me and those few others who have no place in this world. For this world I wish to know to be, I would wound the sky and draw down its terrors on those who oppose us, allowing my army to march unopposed across this world save by force of arms. None in my army can accomplish such an act, milady, but I am told that _you_ can" Kagan said, the question obvious.

That made her blink, the number of people who knew about her experiment with altering the worlds atmosphere and binding almost 1,500 years earlier amounted to three, including her-and this Vrykolakas was not one of the others. Just _who_ had been talking to him about her?

"Indeed I can, although it is no small thing, Vrykolakas Kagan. I used Star Fall as my example and near burnt the world, but _few_ know of that. I would know how _you_ know" she responded, sharply.

"She asked to be remembered to you as Satrina, milady Circe" responded Kagan, without missing a beat. She blinked again, now _that_ was a name she hadn't heard in a very long time...

"I see. In that case, you have my attention and my interest. Tell me more" she said.

Kagan didn't even attempt to hide his smile at her words. Luckily for him, she suspected that she had found herself a purpose once more...

/To be Continued/


	3. Chapter 3

Legal disclaimers: See earlier parts.

Disclaimers: This section continues the process of introducing major characters for the upcoming story I have in mind. Again, graphic violence and themes that people may find offensive will be involved, so don't read on if the idea of various creatures being torn and cut to pieces offends you.

**Alliances**

_Tibet, 1900_

It was winter, the snows falling on the high mountains gently blanketing them with layer after layer of broad snowflakes even as winds whipped the fall into a blizzard that shut away glimpses of blue sky mostly hidden by thick white clouds. Dark peaks rose everywhere the eye could see, while in the occasional valley large rocks and brown earth, sometimes with traces of greenery, were visible.

Ice covered every surface below the snow, while a thin crust had formed atop it as well. With few actual paths or roads in the land at all, the jagged, unstable mountainsides and rough, rocky plains that dotted the landscape were death traps for animals or people not used to or capable of finding their way.

As a result, few animals and even fewer people were about, the animals all either hunting for food or trying to find shelter from the winds and snow after being caught out in it. People who moved about gathered material for fires or gathered food in buried stores placed there months earlier, ready for the winter season.

The structures the people lived in were small, stone huts grouped near mountainsides or even built into them for protection from the elements. Raised some way off the ground in all cases as protection from wild animals, the huts were often connected to each other only by paths driven through rough ground that were almost impossible to reach from below. The huts had no windows, but they did have smoke holes set at the very top of their roofs and a wood-backed canvas door that could be barred shut in bad weather.

Inside, the huts walls were draped with animal's skins to keep in the heat and warm the hut up to the level it could keep the occupants well and healthy. Crudely carved wooden chairs and a small table sat near the fire, while a loom lay against one wall. More skins covered the floor to prevent heat from escaping that way too.

At the moment, though, the doors of all the huts were in shredded pieces and almost all were dotted with specks of red. The truth of what had happened was displayed by a still-cooling hand and forearm hanging out of one doorway, one of the fingers only still attached to the hand by shredded skin as a slow stream of blood fell from the fingertips to the snow, ice slowly forming about the limp, shredded limb even as it lay still.

Beyond that, at the base of another hut, a middle-aged man with a steel-headed hand-axe still in hand lay motionless in deep snow, quickly being covered by more even as ice formed in his thin beard and long hair, becoming ridges on his cold-weather furs and leathers. Entrails and blood exploded out of his midsection, surrounding him in a near-circle of crimson with chunks of meat everywhere, as though his insides had been gnawed upon before he died. His eyes were still, silent and empty, but he had also only died recently as his fading body heat continued to melt some of the snow falling on his skin and flesh.

A young woman lay in a shattered heap atop one of the huts, her left arm torn completely off of her body and thrown to the ground several feet away. The impossible angles of her legs made it evident her legs had been smashed by an incredible impact before she died, while the awful twist in her back displayed a broken back. Her throat had been torn out, the wound that had evidently finally killed her, but a silver dagger in her right hand was coated in frozen red blood and made it clear she had fought to the death even crippled. A smashed old crossbow and empty quiver lay near her, telling the story of the battle recently fought here.

A mass of bodies, old men, women and children, lay back against the cliff, almost concealed but revealed by the horrors of shredded flesh, shattered bone and gouting blood from hideous injuries that stained snow, rock and ragged, tattered remnants of clothing. Any onlooker would have realised that these were the people too young or too old to fight, sent to a hoped-for place of safety and defended to the death by those armed and able to do so. Clearly, it had not been enough.

Only two oddities were evident. A naked man in his mid-thirties, with dark hair and eyes, massively physically powerful, lay near the fallen fighter with an axe. His chest had been shattered by several strikes from the axe, half his head was a bloody tangle and two crossbow bolts stuck out of him, one in his upper left leg, the other in his heart.

The second was a younger naked man evidently in his early twenties, who was already almost buried in snow but seemed strangely pale despite his tanned skin and flaming red hair. Only one wound was evident on him, his throat had been savaged as though by a wild animal, both jugular veins had been torn open and, impossibly, there was almost no visible sign of blood loss. Instead, an increasingly small trail of seemingly dripping blood from a wound led away from his body at a space between impacts which suggested whatever had caused the injuries had been running. As fast as it could-or, in this case, _she_ could.

Almost a mile away from the village, running as fast as her child's legs could carry her, frantically trying not to think about what she'd just done to the _thing_ which had attacked her, the thirteen year old girl who would one day become the woman known as Mynce was almost out of her mind with fear. She'd just seen her mother, the woman atop the huts, slaughtered by creatures which were neither wolf or man. Her Grandfather had died, axe in hand, killing one of the creatures. Then the Wolf men had moved on to those few others who could fight, followed by those who couldn't, forcing Mynce to watch everyone she knew and loved die-and she had no idea why.

She didn't even know how she'd killed the one who had come after her so suddenly. She'd smelt blood, then her mouth had suddenly been nothing but agony, her mind all darkness and rage-and she'd literally attacked the two big veins in the things throat as though nothing else mattered in the world. He'd made an impossible noise trapped somewhere between a scream and a howl, tried to force her off of him-then collapsed, shuddering, his strength seemingly gone. When she'd realised that the reason was she was drinking his blood, she'd torn herself loose and run. Now, she knew, the other wolves would be after her, at least seven of them-and she had no hope of escape, or survival.

She was only just over four feet tall, her limbs were still short and stick-thin with almost no muscle to speak of. Her body was so thin she was almost more bone than flesh, while shoulder-length black hair was flung around by the wind as she ran. Amber eyes were sharp and watched for anything out of the ordinary, while swarthy smooth skin tanned by the strong sun they received when the snow was not about showed around her clothes.

All she had had time to put on when the attack began was a pair of leather leggings and shirt, snow boots and a hastily grabbed woollen cloak. It wasn't really enough to keep her warm, but for some reason she had a suspicion that the fresh blood she had inside her might be the reason she felt no cold. Again, though, thinking about it almost made her have to stop and throw it all up. She kept it down with a supreme effort of will, she couldn't afford to stop for any weakness or horror now...

That was when she heard the soft _thump-thump_ of the Wolf-Men approaching, easily catching up with her-and passing her. In desperation she kept running, with no idea what else she could do...

Then a naked man stepped out of the snow immediately in front of her and stopped her dead simply by slamming both hands into her chest, catapulting her from her feet and over backwards. She came to rest, dazed and breathless, face-up, to find herself staring straight into the face of a tall, blond haired and blue-eyed man whose handsome face was twisted in a vicious snarl that took away any suggestion of humanity.

"...It'sss over, pretty one, they are all dead, all gone. You are ours now, your father wants you and he owes us..." hissed the blonde man. She had no idea what he was talking about, her father had died before she was born, her mother had told her so-

Blood suddenly drenched her face, a great deal of it going down her throat-as well as bits of flesh and even some bone. Momentarily blinded, she frantically blinked her eyes clear-and came face to face with the Wolf Mans heart, held in a human hand with talons extending from all fingers and thumb, leading to an arm that had punched right through the Wolf Mans chest from behind.

The blonde man stared down at his own heart in the hand for a long moment, not realising he was dead, then the hand was torn back out of him, along with the heart. She saw his death in his open eyes even before he collapsed atop her.

Roars of fury echoed everywhere, but all Mynce could see was a dark-clad figure leaping right over her, a human woman apparently, but for those talons. Then a Wolf attacked her, so fast Mynce's eyes couldn't even register the movement. The woman was even faster, tearing out her attackers throat and shattering his upper chest even before she landed. She hit and turned in one smooth movement, leaping again to meet a Wolf in mid-air. Incredibly, her own strength was greater and the far larger Wolf was flipped over backwards before she ripped its head clean off with her bare hands and threw it away.

A third Wolf attacked her, but she straight-armed it in the face and punched its head into its body with a sickening crack of breaking bone. Another came at her more cautiously, but she charged it and got it in a bear hug before it could react. She closed both arms with such force that the echoing crack of breaking bones let everyone who could hear it know that she'd broken every bone in the Wolfs body even before she tossed it aside.

The last two came at her from both sides at once, claws and fangs slashing in like living razor blades, only they collided head-on as they passed _through_ the woman as though she was no more solid than a ghost. Without even breaking stride, both of the woman's talon-led hands cut downwards hard and severed the spines of the Wolves before either could shake off the shock. Even as the horrified Mynce watched, the woman checked that all of the Wolf-Men were truly dead, then slowly walked over and picked up the dead body covering Mynce herself before casually tossing it aside.

As she knelt down, Mynce realised that it was the first opportunity she'd had to get a good look at the woman. Once she had, though, she didn't know what to think. Not for decades afterwards.

Five foot nine inches tall, long black hair shot through with traces of bloody red. Brilliant blue eyes that she could not think of any real comparison for. Black leather vest that left her arms free, revealing her midriff and cut down at the top far enough that cleavage was exposed, while leather leggings of the same colour outlined slim but well-muscled legs. Hard black boots with steel toecaps covered her feet, while fingerless gloves with silver punching spikes covered her hands. A long black leather coat swirled about her in the wind like a Ravens wings, while her exposed skin displayed swirling tattoo's that seemed to be...moving, even as she just stood still, shifting about golden, almost dusky skin.

With a body and beauty to kill for, all firm curves and smooth lines, the woman looked maybe twenty-five but just meeting her eyes told Mynce that she was far older than that. Also, even though she was a child, a part of her mind warned to never, ever look at the woman's tattoos for longer than a few moments. They seemed even more ancient than she did, somehow, as though they were something that should be forgotten, "hidden" in plain view in the woman's skin and flesh...

"Hello, little one" came the woman's voice, a soft, sultry purr that was somehow at odds with her ferocious display mere seconds earlier. "My name is Selena, Selena Alice Hayden. What's yours?" she asked, gently...

/To be continued/


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimers: for all Disclaimers, see earlier Parts. However, for this Part specifically, I need to point out that I do not own the character or concept of Dracula nor lay any sort of claim. I am just borrowing him for the purposes of telling this fictional story.

**Strategy**

_Near Bucharest, Europe, 1476_

The man on the floor was blood-drenched and wounded, fatally attacked, but he wasn't dead yet. His red-black heavy horseman's armour was pierced in a dozen places, his body torn up by slashes and stab wounds.

His weapons were broken or lost, he could barely move and couldn't speak, but his hard grey eyes were still sharp and focused with a great intelligence, driven by a truly vicious, ruthless Will and determination to survive and win. Black hair edged by grey surrounded a still smooth and handsome face coloured by a black moustache, the man still handsome and evidently youthful even in his mid forties.

He was the greatest Warlord since Genghis Kahn, but many said that he was an even greater monster, as evidenced by the name most knew him by, "The Impaler". He was a man of genius on the battlefield who led his men from the front and slaughtered far more than his share in every battle, but, after over twenty years of Warfare, he had finally fallen. What would only ever be known to very few, though, was that this was not his end.

"NO!" screamed a woman, her voice high and sharp, her cry half-scream half-howl. The sound echoed around the room, so loud that it seemed to shake the windows and raise dust from the floor. He felt he should know the voice...but he couldn't remember it now. He couldn't remember much of anything as his lifeblood flowed out of him and into _its_ mouth.

_It_, she, was a monster far greater pain, suffering and skill at slaughter than he would ever know came to as naturally as putting one foot in front of the other. As she knelt beside him, her fangs in his throat, swallowing with practised ease, as he felt his heart slowing, he knew that his Path would only make him more of what he was-more like _her_. That was nothing to fear, but he did fear death-a little.

The small, stone hut left over from ages past, built by Shepherds and wanderers in case of terrible weather, stood still and strong. None of that changed the fact the roof and the small hole in it were stained with dark soot from many fires, the walls and floor were almost covered with animal muck and the remnants of food and straw. The doorway was barely covered by a ragged, battered and near-broken thin wooden door which didn't even keep out the wind, let alone the rain. It stank, it was damp and illness was evident to the eyes.

None of that had stopped her from dragging his wounded body into it from the battlefield, dying as his life spilled out of him from a terrible gut wound. None of that had stopped her from biting into his throat to seemingly hasten the process of his Passing. None of that had stopped the female stranger from kicking down the door when she'd arrived.

"You BITCH-! You PROMISED me-!" shouted the woman, her voice rising to a screech as he halfway sensed her striding towards him. Not that it mattered, there was nothing any human could do against his Mistress.

The woman, the monster drinking his blood shifted away from him, but didn't release him. Ruby hair slick like running blood spilled thick and full down over her shoulders and back, a marked contrast to dead bone-white skin and eyes totally lacking in colour.. Dark dirty-red blood spilled out around her mouth and, in one case, traced a line down her cheek. She was wearing a loose black dress that barely outlined lush curves and long limbs that he knew all too well, while the beauty displayed by impossibly fine features, full lips and fine hair defied description.

He'd never been able to tell what she was looking at, but all of a sudden he knew that he was no longer the centre of her attention. Then his heart stopped, for an impossibly brief moment that felt like an Eternity, before starting again at far too slow a speed. He wasn't dying, he was dead, the final darkness swallowing him...

One last effort at life and consciousness flickered, allowing him a blurred glimpse of the new arrival, dark-haired, pale-skinned, young. His mistress's torn-open wrist in his mouth, forcing her blood down his throat... Then all was gone.

When he woke up, hours later, the sun was down and long gone. He easily rose to his feet with a grace he had never possessed in life, feeling new strength saturating his muscles and power curling around whatever passed for his Soul now. He could hear people sleeping in the nearby city, smell traces of everyone who had been in or near the hut any time recently, taste his own dried blood in his own mouth-and he could tell it apart from hers.

His eyesight had become so sharp that he could almost see through the gaps between stones to the outside-in fact, if he focused on just his eyes, he _could_. He could feel the still air sliding across his ruined clothes and exposed skin as he moved... So _this_ was what being a Strigoi meant. He felt as though he could leap atop a building with a single bound, run all day and all night without stopping…no, he was wrong there. The day was lost to him now, a small price to pay.

His wounds were healed without even a scar, he was so much _more_ than he had been, he would live so much longer he could achieve what he had truly being working for and towards. He had all the time in the world and more, _his_ time now, no one else's, to do as he wanted-

That was he finally placed the new woman's voice and what little he'd seen of her appearance as he'd died. If his heart had still been beating, it would have stopped in shock. He was shocked still and silent for long moments, then just growled in anger and frustration.

"Lilith" he snarled, his voice more animal growl than human rumble of fury it had once been. "LiliTTTTHHHHHHH!"

_Castle Dracula, Eastern Europe, 1945_

Vlad Tepe's, known as Dracula to those few who had met him and survived the experience, poked at the dying fire in his decaying fortress with an ancient Poker he had first used four hundred years earlier. Dim, burning wooden torches barely lit the feast hall of his castle, almost hiding worn furniture and cobwebbed corners, while old wooden stairs creaked as they warmed, misshapen by damp which had so long penetrated the castle walls.

He rarely left the feast hall any longer, except to sleep in his bed in the castle Dungeon. The bed was large, hard and comfortable, just the way he liked it. It was also the only piece of furniture he'd bought for the castle since the twentieth century began. It suited him, he knew he'd grown soft, comfortable in his power, so now he lived in a rotting stronghold and hid in a dungeon. The fiasco with Van Helsing at the very end of the last century had proven that.

He was still every bit the man he had been, the Gift hadn't taken that from him, but he'd let himself come to believe that he no longer really needed to use his mind to get what he wanted from mere mortals after almost half a millennium on this planet. He'd resorted to brute force and sledgehammer Diplomacy, threats and attempted Blackmail as he'd Turned the woman of one of his opponents to defy them and prove they could not defeat him, the "Dark King" of legend. The result had been his opponents had run him out of London like a dog with it's tail between it's legs, chased him all the way back to his stronghold like Bloodhounds with the scent and come at him like Berserkers of old, catching him outside his own front gate!

He was luckier than he deserved to have survived. If Van Helsing had known that he could Rise before darkness fell, or that he could turn to Mist at a thought, a rare skill that was a Gift from his Sire, the group of hunters chasing him would have Staked him out, sawed his head off, cut his heart out and burnt him to ashes. Even an Immortal could die, it was time he remembered that. But, after almost half a century of thought, he'd realised he simply didn't know any other way to live.

He was a Warlord, a fighter, a warrior and a soldier. Conflict was in his blood, pain was in his brain, he could no more change himself or what he loved than he could turn back time. He was a lost being who had lost his purpose and could not find another, which left him wondering what would come next, what _could_ come next. He needed something to sink his teeth into, to draw him out of himself and let him live again. But, with the second Mortal "World War" over, he was at a dead end again. Small regional conflicts simply didn't do it for him any longer, not enough blood...

He raised his head as he caught a trace of a scent that he had never known before, his dead body showing no other trace of his attention being drawn. Before, that was, he spun around and ran the length of his feast hall in less time than it took to tell. His hand snapped out as though he was trying to punch through wall and fastened around the throat of a figure which had been hidden in the shadows, then he wrenched whoever it was out to face him so fast and he doubted the individual was human, since it's neck didn't break.

He found himself staring into the face of a seemingly young woman, with Olive skin, light brown eyes and a deceptively slim frame. Sharply beautiful, with slightly slanted eyes and thin lips, he could tell with a glance her long body was all muscle with elegant curves in all the right places. He could also tell that she wasn't human for certain, her heart beat far too slowly and strongly for that. A full breath of her scent told him the rest-_Dhampir_, half human half Vampire.

He'd met Dhampir before, to say Vampires and Dhampir had an adversarial relationship was akin to saying Demon's and Angels stopped every so often for a drink and a chat because they had nothing better to do. Dhampir were a mistake of Genetics and the form of magic that made Vampires, they were never supposed to have existed and wanted every Vampire that existed dead just as much as the Vampires wanted every Dhampir dead. However, he'd never heard of a Dhampir Hunter stupid or desperate enough to attempt to hunt a Vampire Lord in his own citadel before now.

At six foot two he was six inches taller than her, while his broad shoulders and solid frame made him almost three times her weight at a guess. He had no doubts as to her intelligence given how far she'd gotten without either his guards or he himself sensing her, but such actions did make him wonder about her Sanity. That made him wonder, though, just what purpose she could have had doing what he'd caught her doing.

She was wearing a black silk formfitting body suit, over which she'd hung a short cape to cover her shoulders and a hood to conceal her face. Shoulder-length black hair fell loose about her face and shoulders, highlighting her face and throat in a very pleasant way. A knife holster of darkened leather held three knives across her chest, with two more evident one to each lower leg.

A glimpse of her back showed him her two main weapons, sheathed at the base of her spine, hooked short swords which required real skill to properly use. Interesting-especially since she showed no sign of reaching for a weapon or even fighting back.

Of course, even unarmed, wearing an open white shirt, black leggings and boots she would stand little chance against him...

"My...Lord...Dracula..." she managed to get out, evidently having trouble drawing breath as her windpipe was slowly crushed, her accent not one recognised. Out of simple curiosity, he relaxed his grip enough to allow her to draw breath.

"Speak quickly, woman. Why are you here and what do you wish to say before I kill you?" he asked, sharply.

"Lord Dracula, I am Mynce, once an Agent of the Brimstone Society, now an enemy of them and all they stand for. I come to you with a question and an offer. Once you have heard me, you may do what you wish with me. I will not fight you" replied the woman, making a point of holding her hands out clear away from her weapons. Interesting again, he couldn't help but think.

"Go on" he replied, lowering her to the floor, slowly. He was taking no chances here.

"My Lord, a War is coming amongst our kind and others, with and against humans, we both know this. We will all have to choose sides when it does, but it is worth remembering that there is always a third choice when battle comes, as you know. So I ask you this: if the Warlord is tired of War, for now at least, will you choose not to fight? If you do, Lord, my Mistress would be most interested in speaking with you" said Mynce, speaking quickly and clearly.

That speech actually gave him pause for thought, not that he dropped his guard for even a moment. Everyone of any power and knowledge knew that a War was coming, with humanity so weakened by two great Wars in just two generations and whole lands left in chaos. Besides which, the Great Slaughter those of the Cross had carried out against so many of their own race had weakened them all more than any mortal could know. There was little better way to empower those Beyond than to kill en masse, so now power almost rolled around in his world, free and ample for the taking.

He and those like him hadn't been so strong and empowered since before the Renaissance and, more importantly, they had _never_ faced a humanity in such a weakened position. Various forces and Warlords, even Kings and Queens, had been manoeuvring since before the first great War to take advantage of the slaughter the new century had delivered them. With the blood-drenched end of the second War, he knew they were ready. But was he? Did he _want_ to be?

"Who is your Mistress, Dhampir?" he asked, curiously. In response, she produced a glass tube of blood from up a sleeve and held it out to him. Sure he could snap her neck before any poison could even weaken him, let alone kill him, he used his free hand to pop the top off of the vial and sipped the blood inside-

..._He was suddenly looking down on his own castle from the sky. Then the whole of his homeland, then the whole world. Oceans passed by in the blink of an eye, he could smell the blood of millions in cities and towns, spot where his people lived and hid as though camouflage and spells were nothing, could tell where the Great Powers were_ _as though he simply should know_...

Coming back to himself slowly, he threw back all of the blood in one go. His eyes rolled up in his head and he nearly fell.

..._He was somewhere else, watching twelve figures Praying to some Greater Power. He couldn't quite make out the name they were calling out aloud, but he could tell two thing. All of the twelve cloaked figures were Vampires, very old, very powerful one's. Also, the book they were reading from was made from human skin and flesh, written in ancient blood._

_He suddenly just knew that he had to find those Vampires, learn what they knew and_ _who they prayed to for what purpose_...

Not at all to his surprise, he discovered that he had released Mynce when he returned to himself once more. "I believe...that I would very much like to meet your Mistress" he managed, slowly, his voice hoarse...

_**The End?**_


	5. Chapter 5

**Independence**

_New Haven, Connecticut, the North American Colonies_

_February 12__th__, 1782_

The building was large for the time, a two-storey structure with sloped slate roofs, a towers sloping roof rising sharply to one side atop a short tower extension added to one side of the building after the original building had been completed. White-painted walls were filled with broad windows, dark now in the dead of night, while huge and heavy wooden double doors presented the buildings front entrance.

A good distance beyond the main structure a tall stone wall with a metal gate surrounded the building, while beyond the house and behind it broad swathes of green grass and golden corn shone under the silver light of the moon. A carriage road ran from the front of the house to the gate and beyond, but nothing moved on it now.

The night was cold, clear and cloudless, with a full moon hanging bright and clear overhead as a cool wind shifted leaves and trees in the darkness. The night was so still and dead that, for all of the winds motion, nothing obscured craters and valleys evident on the moons surface. Stars lit up the sky while the moon cast down silver light on the still surface of the world, highlighting the roof of the silent building.

_**CLOSER**_

Inside the building stone walls were easily evident, supported by sturdy wooden supports. A solid wooden floor, well-fitted and highly polished, led to stairs up a broad staircase covered by a carpet to prevent slipping. A broad and long dining room lay off to the left, filled with a massive wooden table. A living room with a couch, two armchairs and a smaller table set around a fireplace sat to the right. To the right and left of the stairs doors were evident, leading down into the basement and the Servants quarters. Four rooms were evident upstairs, although all of the doors were closed.

_**HUNGRY**_

Under one of the stairs, a fact invisible from outside the house, a dim light showed, gleaming out from under the door. The expensive and recent furnishings of the house, along with the evident artworks half-hidden in the darkness, suggested wealth and power in this place and age. None of that was important now.

The inside of what was obviously the Master Bedroom was lightly illuminated by candles on both sides of the room. A broad, thick bed sat in the middle of the room, while a desk sat in the left corner with a tall, wide mirror set atop it. A window with blinds drawn across it was set into an outside wall, while a portrait of the householders family- the young man and his young wife, well and richly dressed, a grey-haired tall older man-was set on the opposite wall.

In the bed itself, a young man and woman were coupling, inexpertly, awkward moments of passion combined with tentative touches and caresses. The man had thick black hair, a finely muscled body and the benefit of youth and plenty of sun to make him look healthy and hale. The woman's hair was so dark auburn it was verging on red, let down thick and unbound it was almost as though fire threatened the pillow, the bed and the man. A glimmer of green eyes shone in a face of remarkable beauty but unusual shape, as though her face were somehow..._longer_ than it should be.

Lush curves and smooth skin pressed against the man's body to make him unconcerned about such things, though, full red lips pressed to his own taking his breath away as hard muscle under sweat-slick skin shifted just _that_ way underneath him. The woman was the more experienced of the two, but there was no question she was using her beauty to hide away from what she either knew or suspected but didn't want anyone else to.

_**FEED**_

A once-male mind reached out into the mans body, drew the rest of itself in afterwards and anchored itself to his Soul, riding his body like it was a toy horse. Suddenly his movements were far more focused and assured-and directed towards only one purpose: physical pleasure, ultimate satisfaction.

For a few moments the woman didn't realise what was happening, then his hand slammed down over her mouth as she moved to scream too late. She thrashed, punched, clawed and slapped, but might as well have tried to move a mountain as he had his way with her, as he wished to. Last of all, impossibly, she would later say that his eyes had changed colour, from dull grey to impossibly pure and clear blue...

Nine months later, both the man and the woman would discover that _something_ had indeed happened that night...

_New Haven, Connecticut, 1795_

Selena Alice Hayden was bored, which meant she was wandering around the gardens of the family estate as she had often been told not to do. Since the family estate had been established thirty years before, before the War of Independence even, the planted bushes, trees and grass had grown to encompass the mansion in a well-tended luxury of greenery, brilliant flowers of many colours and tall, heavy trees. She found the places hidden by tree trunks and shade an excellent place to hide, especially from her Mother...

Anna Fontyn-Hayden, her Mother, had always been somewhat...strange around her. She flinched when Selena tried to touch her, would rarely meet her own daughter's eyes and spoke to her child only when she was left with no choice.

Anna, Selena knew, was a proud woman who hated to accept that anything could not be arranged precisely the way she wished because of lack of wealth, influence or ability. As a beautiful young woman heading towards middle age at thirty-six, she believed that life owed her more than she had ever received. Worse, she was woman capable of many things to get what she wanted. Even at thirteen, Selena recognised ruthlessness in her mother that she didn't like at all. The rest she knew from overhearing Servants talking behind Anna's back, when they thought her too-perceptive child couldn't hear them.

Her Father, Rufus Matthew Hayden, was a different matter. A man born weak of will but with a sharp mind, he was more than capable of looking after the families business affairs but was far less capable of managing his own household. His Father, her Grandfather, regularly forced Rufus to do as he was told by simply giving him no choice in the matter using words alone, while his Wife ran his household like a Tyrant.

Despite these facts, her Father made the effort to care for her where few others did. He sat with her to teach her himself at least once a day, tried to get to know her, went for a walk with her regularly on weekends and even listened to what she had to say. He cared, which was more than she could say for the rest of her family. Her Grandfather saw even his own son, her father, as a tool, while her Mother wanted more than she could ever have and left everyone to suffer the weight of her failed ambition. How was she ever supposed to really care about people like that?

She sighed as she walked through the morning sunshine, shaking her head. She'd never socialised, true, for some reason it had never seemed appropriate to her parents, but she did have friends-of a sort-amongst the children of the house servants. They all thought little of her Mother and Grandfather, only a little better of her Father, but what they thought of _her_ was the strangest of all.

Her hair, held in a tight ponytail down her back, was a dark black so complete that one could get lost in the strands, but for the traces of brilliant, bloody red that illuminated it in places. Her eyes were so pure and clear blue that the most brilliant sun-filled cloudless sky failed to compare, while everyone said that to look her in the eyes for any length of time burnt on the inside.

Her skin was an odd colour, a dark, tawny shade mixed with traces of an even darker shade, but none of this took away from a creamy, almost pale luxurious colouring that dominated her body. Her youthful body was still forming into a woman's from the child she had been, but curves were filling out and a sharp beauty that, somehow, only made her seem even more exotic thanks to a bone structure different to any other woman's she knew drew any and every male eye. For a woman she was tall, slim and elegant in a way that made men breathe in sharply when she went past them, but she wasn't sure if that was supposed to please her or not.

Today, in the brilliant sunshine of a warm, clear summers day, she was wearing a light blue dress that fell gently over her body and shoes that were, for once, actually intended for walking, not prancing around on a dance floor. Not that she _minded_ dancing, she was actually extraordinarily talented at it-her Tutor kept telling her that, so it had to be true-but it wasn't something she wanted to spend her life at. She simply preferred walking, it gave her time to think...

She caught sight of the small Carriage just before she would have turned the corner, smiled and strolled up to it, as the baby inside spotted her and giggled, holding up his hands for her to hold. She held out her left hand, fingers spread, right over him and, of course, he grabbed two of her fingers immediately. He liked to play with her fingers and hand, as though he was wrestling, which made her believe that he would be a fighter when he grew up. Like her, maybe? She could hope.

His eyes were blue, although nowhere near the extraordinary colour of her own. His hair was a dark auburn, coming closer to his mothers colouring than his fathers, although again his colouring was little like her own. His soft skin was pale yet gently tanned and, given enough time, she had no doubt that he would produce a healthy golden tan, something she would never know. He looked happy, healthy and very, very young...why did those words make her think, again, that she had never been like that, herself?

His name was Thomas Jeffrey Hayden and he was her baby Brother, less than a year old, possibly the only real family she had in this world. With a Mother who disliked her at best, hated her outright at worst, a Father who only really tried to get to know her, she suspected, because he believed that he should and a Grandfather who did his best to not even acknowledge her existence? If it had to be her and her Brother against the world, against even their own so-called family? So be it.

"..._Logan_ ..." came a voice from not far away at all, maybe just beyond the next hedge over. A woman's voice, her _Mothers_ voice, whispering the name of a man who was not her father, out far beyond the mansion where she couldn't easily be seen or heard?

"..._Wish you were_..." came her Mothers voice, again, this time accompanied by a hitch in her words that seemed odd to Selena, as though her Mother was being physically distracted by something. A small cry followed, a sharply indrawn breath, then a sound that was almost like a laugh, a purr of...pleasure?

"..._Want you_..." came her Mothers voice, again. This time Selena could make out the rustle of what could only be clothing being disturbed by none too gentle hands, the soft rumble of sound and pleasure combined that could only be the result of a man and a woman kissing on the lips. She'd tried it herself with one of the young men of the Servants children, it hadn't been bad, but she hadn't sounded like _that_...

Not sure what she was doing or why, Selena walked, slowly and carefully, around the hedges shielding her Mother from the mansion and her. When she came in sight of her Mother, though, she simply stopped, dead-and her heart nearly did the same at what she saw.

Her Mothers back was to her, but the face of the man _so_ close to her Mother wasn't. A man who had _no_ business being anywhere _near_ her mother.

His name was Logan Hallan, a short man barely over five feet tall _she_ had six inches on, a solid, muscular man with old scars from the War of Independence all over his body from a dozen battlefields. His hair was thick and black, edged with grey since he was in his mid forties, but he was still as strong as he'd ever been and as vicious a man as anyone on the mansion's staff had ever known. So bad-tempered and physically destructive he was almost feral, given the way he lived in a shack in the woods and rarely seemed to ever meet another human being for any length of time.

With his shirt off he looked even more like a wild animal, thick black hair covering most of his body over heavy, thick muscle, but it wasn't him she was looking at. It wasn't his fifteen year old son Jacob she was looking at either, a near exact copy of his father who had yet to grow into his almost repellent muscularity, a child squatting on all fours just out of sight of her Mother watching his Father and her Mother together.

What she was looking at was something no child should see. Her Mothers grey silk blouse was on the ground, her shift pressed down around her waist and hips, her entire upper body, her rounded breasts, utterly exposed. Her skirt was bunched up around her upper legs and was being pushed up further by Logan, who's tattered old trousers gave ample evidence of what he and her Mother were about to do together. Even as Selena watched, Logan 's head lowered and his tongue ran across her Mothers breasts and nipples, followed by nipping sharp teeth...

"...Mother..." she barely managed, her voice so weak that she hardly even heard herself speak. She wasn't anything like her father, she did _not_ show weakness like he did, but this...?

Her Mother didn't hear her speak, but Logan did. His head snapped up with a vicious snarl and his eyes narrowed as he took her in. "_**Jacob!**_" he snapped out, voice sharp as a whip and hard as Granite, as though he sharpened his teeth on hard rock. His son didn't even hesitate, leaping to his feet and tackling Selena to the ground with such force he knocked the air out of her lungs. He was sat on top of her with her arms pinned up above her head by his dead weight, his hands on her wrists as he deliberately ground his groin into her belly.

She was stunned for a long second, but never took her eyes off of her Mother. She couldn't have if her life had depended on it, for all of her intelligence she couldn't take this in. This _couldn't_ be happening...could it?

Her Mother paused in enjoying Logan 's caresses to look around and see what the disturbance was, a smile slowly spreading across her face when she saw Selena. Something about that expression being on her Mother's face in the current circumstances made a chill run up Selena's spine. Without the slightest sign of shame or modesty her Mother turned to face her and critically looked her up and down, the pale marks of a man who was not her Husbands hands still evident on her skin.

"What would you have us do with her, milady?" asked Logan , with a broad smile even as he ran his fingers across her Mothers back and down to beneath the top of her skirt. Her Mothers eyes narrowed as she looked at Jacob, perched atop her daughter and restraining her with sheer muscle against her will. Selena didn't doubt that Jacob would be Ordered off of her for his insolence-

"Teach her the price of disobedience. Maybe she will actually learn something" said her Mother, with a sneer, before turning back to Logan . He nodded with a vicious smile at Jacob, whose answering grin was truly feral. He let go of her arms completely, punched her in the face before she could move or speak, then grabbed the front of her dress and started to tear at it. Something died in Selena then.

All of a sudden, even as she watched her Mother's remaining clothes fall to the floor as though it was nothing, Selena just didn't care, consumed by an anger she didn't even know she _could_ feel. A moment later she was standing up, a startled Jacob hanging from one hand as though he weighed less than a feather to her-then he was thrown through the air as though hurled by a Giant, disappearing from sight before he landed with a crash and a scream of pain.

A shocked Logan wrenched free of her Mother and went for Selena with a fast roundhouse punch, but he might as well have told her an hour earlier that he was going to use such an attack and she was inside his guard before he'd even stepped towards her. Her counter lifted him off of the floor as he folded up around her punch to his gut like a rubber band and fell to the ground like a rotten tree, unmoving and barely breathing, blood drooling out of his mouth.

Without hesitation her Mother slapped her across the face, hard enough to force her head around and let her taste her own blood in her mouth. Selena paused, as much because she shared blood with her Mother as because of the sudden pain.

"Stupid little _bitch_, you have no idea what your doing. I'll teach you, though, even if it kills you-!" snapped her Mother, her voice full of contempt-and no little fear, Selena noticed. Too late. Too little, far too late.

All of a sudden Selena's fingers burned as jet-black talons erupted from her fingertips as though they'd always been there, three inch long killing tools. She stepped forwards and lunged, slashing her talons through the air and into flesh then back into the air, trailing blood and traces of flesh as though there was no difference. In fact, to her, there wasn't. The only difference was the fact that her Mother was lying on the ground, screaming in agony, both hands clasped over deep wounds in her side as blood poured out, coating her hands and side and pooling on the ground beneath her with terrible speed...

After that, most of what happened occurred in a blur as she just stood still and stared at her Mother as she bled, not caring about anything else, nor anyone else. Why would she, after all?

Her Mothers screams got the attention of everyone in the mansion and its grounds in seconds. Workers and Servants came running, some armed with Muskets, clubs and knives, others sweaty and exhausted from the fields, still more coming running out of the house believing someone was being Murdered.

Her Father and Grandfather were amongst the first to arrive, her Father leaning heavily on a walking stick as he was still recovering from the gunshot wound which had nearly killed him. He looked appalled at what he saw when he first arrived, but when he saw Logan and his Wife's state of undress his expression changed to reflect first of all disbelief, then anger, then bitter, bitter disappointment-and understanding.

Her Grandfather, though...tall, grey-haired, with a thick beard and moustache, heavy-set and a physically powerful man even in his mid sixties, grey eyes burning hard in a face which had never smiled, he took one look at the scene and recognised what had happened. But he didn't become angry with his Step-Daughter or her would-be Lover, instead his eyes fastened on Selena and the blood on her hands, the wounds in her Mothers side... When she met his eyes, something terrible was barely contained behind that man's eyes.

"_I'll_ take care of this, son. You see to your Wife" was all the old man-Joseph Shepherd Hayden-said. His son, her Father, didn't question the old man, of course. As a result, an hour later, Selena found herself locked in a cage atop the back of a wagon held under a thick blanket that stank of unspeakable things being taken away from the only home she'd ever known. Three days after that she was left to rot, chained up and left helpless in a Madhouse in New York . Five years later, she discovered that she had died that day.

_New York, the North American Colonies, 1800_

Jonathon Yeager was, officially, a wealthy industrialist in the still-young USA, a rising star in his late 30's who sold every kind of weapon available to man, ammunition for all of them, gear and clothes for every environment and even tools which might be necessary. Unofficially, he dealt in all kinds of goods that had nothing to do with exploration, survival or fighting-and made sure that the bulk of his wealth and resources went to where _he_ knew they needed to go. This had nothing to do with his business "Partners", of course.

It had to do with what Jonathon's real purpose in life was. What he, as far as he was concerned, had been born to do. It was something very few people knew about him-and only one man in the wrecked cell with him was among those few. He was a Brimstone Lord, a Warrior and Protector of Humanity, a man whose true purpose was to defend the world and it's people against any and every threat from what was referred to as the "Beyond". As such, very little scared him any longer, since seeing your friends being literally torn to pieces by Werewolves and Rise from the Dead as a Zombie to attack you tended to shut down the ability to feel fear as a form of self-preservation.

He _was_, however-or had been-scared of the woman he had come here to meet. He and Lord Peter Menway, who was looking simply stunned, had been startled to discover what happened when they had arrived. Seeing it, though...was another matter.

The ageing building had been built almost a hundred years ago to hold the man and the insanely dangerous, hundreds of which had passed through its doors and died in its cells over the intervening years. He didn't care at all for any of those, the days of madmen making their way by force of arms and horrific acts of violence were gone with the rise of technology so evidently, but he _did_ care when Reports reached the Brimstone Society stating that a woman clearly demonstrating Vampiric characteristics, who had no fear of the Sun, was being held in this place.

The cell she had been held in, however, had been contained deep inside the grey stone building with barred windows and doors, thick walls set between her and the outside world. Mould was evident on some of the walls, it was cold and damp and some mud had somehow made its way inside. A bucket was the only toilet, a badly built wooden chair the only comfort thing apart from the bed.

Scattered across the cell now, however, were fragments and stone shards thrown clear of a gaping hole in the wall broad enough for two people to pass through side by side, one which was about six feet tall. The ..._thing_ that lived in the cell for five years had broken out and escaped not long ago They were being shown what had been left behind...

He sighed, shook his head and looked around him again. His curly light-brown hair and beard itched slightly in the cool breeze, despite the bright sun close overhead. He was dressed as finely as would have been expected of a man of his wealth and status, with a cloak across his shoulders which helped to conceal his pistol and knife, but now he felt as though he'd arrived late to a party and wasted the effort since everyone was already gone. His clothes, designed to slow off his slim but powerful frame, were completely wasted now.

"Again, please, so that I can be clear about this. _Who _was she and_ how _did she do this?" he asked, his voice calm and polite as ever, despite his strained temper. He could take it out on an opponent in the Arena later.

"Her name was Selena Alice Hayden, she came here in 1795 as a result of loosing her mind and attacking her family. She was thirteen years old, then. As for how she did this...? As far as we can tell..." replied the Asylum's Overseer, "Well...she punched her way out through the wall..." he said, helplessly.

Jonathon stared at him, looked back at the gaping hole in the wall, stared at the Overseer again, then sighed for a second time. "This" he muttered, under his breath, "Is not going to be easy..."

_West of the North American Colonies, 1802_

After two years of tracking and planning, twenty armed, trained and experienced men with nets might just, Jonathon suspected, prove to not be enough. They'd found the woman with considerable effort, but she'd been running with a pack of Wolverines and had proved to have truly extraordinary senses, even beyond those of any Vampire or Werewolf they'd encountered. The Wolverines were vicious killing machines who would attack on sight anything that violated their territory, while what _she'd_ do...

He' been left throwing up for he didn't know how long when they'd found the remains of the first Hunter she'd encountered. The savaged remains had been partially consumed, bones had been gnawed and pieces of a human body which should never be exposed had been left loose outside the ragged remains of a human being. He'd been tracking her, but _she'd_ found _him_. What she'd done...

If he hadn't been under Orders from the High Council to capture her, he'd have torched the entire forest and let her burn. Nothing with a trace of humanity in its mind or body was capable of what had been done to the Hunter. But there was a reason the Brimstone Society was a hierarchy, you only progressed as you gained in knowledge, skills and experience so that you would, one day, be able to understand the greatest secrets and truths of the Society. One's hidden from all others for a reason, he knew.

Maybe, one day, he would be able to honestly imagine himself in a position of such knowledge and authority. For now, though, he could but honestly serve. For now.

His horse shied under him as he carefully guided it forwards through the snow, snorting and panting in fear as it scented the nearby presence of Wolverines. He kept a hand on the butt of his rifle while holding the reins tight in his free hand, even while he forced himself to be ready to leap off of the horse if the worst happened. His sword struck against his knee as it hung sheathed from his waist, jarring even through his cold-weather clothes, while his knife stayed still and deadly cold in a sheath on his belt opposite his sword.

People, including Peter, had told him he was mad to be carrying a small armoury out into the wilderness like this. But he'd ignored them, certain he was right and it was necessary. He still believed he was right-but he no idea if it would all be enough.

The Hunters were spread out around the cold, white landscape, some in the trees of a nearby forest, some on the fields, some had simply disappeared into various places that they thought worth searching. They _would_ find her, of that he had no doubt, but would the cost be worth it? If he had his way, the answer would have been no, she would have been dead and that would have been that. But, again, it wasn't...

A horn blew from the forest abruptly, then a tall man in furs with a bloody right arm came running out of the forest like Hell itself was after him. His eyes were wild, he was somewhere between running and staggering and his unwounded arm was holding the horn to his mouth as he blew it again even as he came into sight. A fine trail of blood traced behind him into the forest, where he had clearly been attacked. He'd been instructed to not blow his Horn unless he was _sure_ it was her, though...!

A humanoid figure exploded out of the forest even as Hunters turned on their heel and ran towards the first man, pounding through snow and skidding over ice with reckless abandon as they realised what was happening. Jonathon unslung his rifle and took aim while Peter, a former soldier, drew out a heavy Musket, aimed and fired all in one smooth movement.

The bronze-skinned woman's skin erupted around her left shoulder, exploding with blood, fragments of flesh and a hint of bone as the Musket Ball struck home at close range. She staggered, but stayed on her feet despite the awful impact and deep wound. She even kept moving, but temporarily lost most of her momentum and almost came to a halt. Jonathon aimed low and fired, shattering her left knee. That dropped her to one knee, but her wounds were already healing in front of their eyes as she tried to rise.

Jonathon shot her again, high in the chest, but her extraordinary muscle and stamina stopped her from being either knocked over or being knocked unconscious by her mounting injuries. Blood dripped from her mouth, making Jonathon think he'd hit a lung, but she only looked more angry. Peter locked his Bayonet into place and charged her on horseback, clearly seeing what Jonathon had-that bullets weren't going to put her down, no matter how many she was hit by. The wounds in her body were already so healed that she was getting back to her feet, if unsteadily-

The Hunters all shot her at once, all of them doing varying amounts of damage as they struck her body. Flesh tore, blood exploded outwards and a hank of hair came loose as a flap of scalp was torn away, exposing smooth white skull drenched in blood and dotted with torn meat. She went back down to her knees hard with new wounds all over her body, including a massive tear in one cheek which exposed too-sharp teeth and fangs, but here eyes only shone brighter, as though the scent of her own blood excited her.

"I want her ALIVE!" roared Jonathon, even as his brain finally took in the curving, slender form and sharp beauty that only a very beautiful woman would ever have, almost all concealed by several layers of dirt, caked long hair, now, blood splattered everywhere. The Hunters heard him, he knew, but he wondered if they would be willing to risk their lives to succeed.

If they knew what they might be up against? He doubted it-so he'd made sure they wouldn't know. A simple necessity for his Mission , ONLY Peter knew otherwise-and, as a former soldier now a Brimstone Lord, he was both capable and reliable.

He sped through the complicated gestures of the Entrapment spell, quickly and clearly speaking the pig Latin words needed to activate it with an ease born of long practise. However, as he Cast it, while he watched the wounded woman-or was it creature?-rise back to her feet even as her wounds visibly healed, he saw something which made his jaw drop even as his eyes opened wide.

She wasn't looking at _him_, she was looking at the Spell he'd been casting. Then, even as he watched, astonishment was too weak a word to describe his reaction as he saw her slash through the air vertically with what looked like Talons-and she _physically_ tore through his Spell before it had any chance at all to coalesce...

_Mage Sight_?! The woman had _Mage Sight_?! Less than one in a million humans ever Possessed or gained such a skill by some means every generation, few of those ever knew it and maybe, at best, one in ten of those who _did_ could use it for real purpose. Even among the Elder Races the Gift was rare in the extreme, few outside of their own Ancients even had access to it.

Then there was the fact that she had _physically_ defeated a Spell specifically designed to entrap her with no Counterspell at all, just the use of Talons that were naturally part of her body. If he hadn't seen it done with his own eyes? He would _never_ have believed such a thing was possible, no matter who told him of it.

What _was_ this woman, this _thing_?! It was impossible to defeat a Spell without either a Counterspell or a specifically crafted Artifact! He'd read all the Histories and every scrap of Occult and Mythical Lore he possibly could, he'd never even seen _suggested_ that there was a being capable of something like this! Did that mean he was dealing with something wholly new...or something very, VERY old?

It was irrelevant for the moment, though, whatever the case. His Orders were to capture the thing, no matter what it took, ALIVE-a fact which had been made very, very clear to him. If it could so casually defeat his Spells, however, he would need something special to hold it...

He was strongly advised to never even dabble in Black Magic, of course. Under anything approaching ordinary circumstances he avoided it as though the mere mention was enough to walk him through the Gates of Hell with the Devil's hand on his shoulder guiding him on. But...no matter how he looked at it, there was only one form of power he knew that could be used to hold anything in a way which couldn't be broken. It would take an act of extraordinary brutality and ruthlessness to accomplish, but he had his Orders and he didn't fail.

As the thoughts he had had ran through his head, the things wounds healed even as it rose to its feet. The Hunters came at it with knives, clubs, short swords and other close-quarter weapons. It was never a battle.

Her first blow shattered a short sword and went on to snap bone like rotten twigs before shredding his internal organs like five razor blades slashing through rotten meat. Her second took off a Hunters weapon arm at the shoulder so cleanly he had to look around to see what had happened. A kick threw a third Hunter twenty feet backwards with a broken back and crushed chest even though her foot barely seemed to touch him, while a slashing kick left a fourth Hunter trying to hold his guts inside him with his hands even as flesh and blood spilled out all over him. She tore out a fifth Hunters throat with her teeth and sucked in so much of his blood with what could at best be seconds of contact that he barely even bled when he fell.

A Hunter lunged for her with a stabbing spear clearly designed to deal with wild Pigs, but she caught it just below the blade one-handed and stopped it dead, literally catching his whole body weight without even blinking. She snapped off the blade without trying and rammed it into the Hunters skull through his eye socket with such force the tip of the steel blade tore out of the back of his skull.

A metal-banded club connected with her left shoulder, but the attacking Hunter might as well have punched a mountain. Her uppercut counter opened him from groin to gullet as organs spilled out of the gaping wound. Blood drenched her from head to foot, adding to fragments of meat and bone to create a nightmare as an animal roar came out of what would seem to be a humanoid throat as she threw herself at more of the Hunters.

A savage slash at waist height left her right arm drenched in blood and gore as a horrified Hunter slid to the ground, torn in half at the waist, still screaming as he fell. A ninth Hunter lost his heart as a taloned hand tore it out of his chest in an explosion of blood, gore and shattered ribs, while a tenth lost the contents of his head and his face as a punch tore right through his skull and came out the other side.

In less than thirty seconds half of the Hunters had been killed and the woman-the _thing_ they were fighting had barely even been touched. Hunters were scrambling or staggering backwards, clearly horrified, shocked, stunned and-in one case-furious. None of it mattered, though, they stood no chance at all against her, armed or unarmed, that was obvious. Thankfully, Jonathon had other options. Horrific options, which were now even easier to employ as the slaughter continued. Black Magic always required a price, it stained the Soul-and it took life to truly work its power. This time, it wouldn't be his he was using.

He had studied but never used Black Magic before. Despite that, the odd words and disturbing gestures seemed to flow naturally as he cast the Spell-then the screaming started. Only he could hear it-or so he thought, until her head snapped around-but he knew what it was. The Souls of the Dead, the ten dead Hunters, were screaming in distress and pain as he dragged them all back from wherever they had been going. What he was doing defied the order of things on so many levels he didn't dare stop to consider what he was doing, he just had to finish it quickly.

He Bound the ten Souls, Forged them into a cage and placed the cage around her. She saw it coming, but-oddly-stood still tracking it with her eyes, not trying to strike at it or escape at all. Of course, escape was impossible where such a Spell was concerned, but she could almost certainly have made it difficult for him... _Why_ wasn't she acting or reacting? The remaining Hunters were backing away from her, clearly scared and suspecting something terrible was about to happen, which was correct, just not in the way they thought. Why wasn't she doing something? What was going through her head..?

She _let_ the Cage settle around her and hold her, she _deliberately_ made no attempt to disrupt or destroy the Spell. Could she know what the Spell was constructed of, maybe even what it was designed to do? Could she be avoiding damaging it _because_ she knew what it was? What _was_ this woman, this _thing_, that she could even possibly perceive a magical cage constructed of Human Souls?

When she was held, Peter drove the Curse Knife into her heart to put her down and keep her that way until she was released, an added, extraordinary precaution due to just what they'd seen so far. Her last act before the Curse bit, though, was to tear out Peter's throat with a lunging attack she should never have been capable of...

_Brimstone Manor, 1820_

Selena Alice Hayden had lost her mind mere days after being sent to the closest thing to Hell on Earth, when her child's mind had shut down, slammed shut the door on reality and broken off the key rather than face the nightmares she was dropped into. What had kept her alive in a state when most human beings would have been simply Catatonic with shock and trauma, she would realise decades later, was the very reason she had ended up in that place originally. She wasn't human, wasn't even close-and the part of her that just wanted to know the world she'd been Created into wouldn't let her lie down and die.

It had taken over when "she" was away and, whatever had happened during that lost time? Nobody had even tried to touch her after the first attempt, ever. Her memory was more than a little hazy regarding that time, but she knew that much. What had happened during her time running with the pack of Wolverines she wasn't sure she _wanted_ to remember. Maybe there would be something of use in there someday, though?

Maybe. Right at this moment, however, matters were very far indeed from alright, let alone good. She had no doubt that, in time to come, she would wish what was about to happen never had, but it couldn't be helped. She had only known two homes in her thirty-eight years of life, the first of which had proved to be nothing but a starting point on the road to Hell. The second was here, a place amongst the monsters _and_ the humans as an Agent of the Brimstone Society. Now she stood to loose that, as well, thanks to something they had _never_ intended her to know coming to her attention in the worst possible way.

She didn't even _like_ Volerige, the ageing Were-Panther Shape-Shifter who had proved himself a formidable Agent the two times they'd been required to work together. But he'd worked for the Brimstone Society for half a century and knew exactly where the edges didn't meet, where the holes were-and how to listen for what wasn't being said. He was utterly reliable regarding what you weren't supposed to know in the Society-and what he'd told her had panned out as far as she'd been able to determine. Given her Contacts and resources inside the Society, that had been a good, hard and deep look, an internal investigation really...and now she knew what was going to happen next.

The ten feet tall and three wide doors to the High Council chamber of the Brimstone Society were warded steel and solid oak three inches thick, with hinges that were part of the metre-thick walls rather than being built into them. The walls weren't just stone and concrete, though, any more than the doors were. They were Warded, many times over, against physical, Mystical and even Psychic assault of every kind, the interior walls and doors even more heavily than the exterior.

From the outside, the Brimstone Society Headquarters looked Count Dracula's holiday home in her opinion-a fact that had stopped being funny after the first time she'd met him in person. Huge and solid, a cross between a mansion and a fortress with battlements, slit and wide windows and even a drawbridge with a portcullis behind that, the structure was surrounded by a moat of murky water.

It was made up of huge, heavy stones sealed together with concrete, over and into all of which Wards, Runes and Spells had been worked to make the whole structure impregnable in every sense of the word. The stone was huge, heavy and a dark black that reminded her of things the Society stood against far too much, the interior colouring of bloody red carpets and paint did nothing to improve matters.

Gothic paintings of former Hero's and Leaders of the Brimstone Societies, often in armour and armed with every kind of weaponry, never failed to show dead bodies of numerous monsters and creatures in every last gory detail. The Hero's and Leaders were always bloodied and wounded yet victorious, shown standing atop a pile of bodies a foot deep at least. Rarely, a portrait of members of the High Council in bloody red ceremonial robes appeared, old men sitting high above behind a six-foot tall wooden rail ringed with steel, faces almost hidden behind the full-face hoods they always wore.

That was all a part of the structure of the Brimstone Society, of course, which was a hierarchical structure, so only the High Council knew _all_ of the secrets of the Society, but it had always stunk of elitism to her. It was a good model for honest, decent, hard-working Agents, male and female, giving them the opportunity to rise as far as talent and training could take them. _But_...dishonest Agents could stack the deck in such a way that there was a ceiling for anyone they didn't like if they were of a mind to, easily.

Not one woman had ever served as a member of the High Council in the Societies 2,100 odd year history, not since it had been created by Alexander the Great. He had, originally, created the Society to defend his soldiers and people from threats such as the Bacchae, Giants and even the occasional rogue Demi-God like Circe with the blood of Olympus in their veins.

But as his Empire had spread so had more and more threats been discovered and encountered-so in the end the Society had been given free reign to deal with the threats any way it could. It had been called by a different name then, but the Society had been created by someone who could be considered the ultimate male leader of history with little imagination... To her, no more needed to be said when that was considered.

In a time when men were God's what was effectively a secret army had been created by those men to fight a secret War that would never be acknowledged. Women, to them, were tools or pleasure, sometimes both, never any serious possibility of more. Even she stood no chance of being any more, despite the fact she could do things NOBODY else could. In fact, she could do things that simply _weren't_ possible, odd as it sounded, a fact she hadn't been aware of until Volerige had filled in the blanks and aimed her at the evidence. What she'd seen and done, without even knowing it, what she'd made _possible_... Some secrets weren't meant to be kept.

She walked up to the doors of the High Council and knocked hard, twice, then again three more times. The Spells, Wards and Guardians all recognised her and her unique Soul signature and allowed her access, the doors creaking open as she advanced into the chamber. The three old men in the seats of power-as she thought of them-barely even visibly reacted to her arrival or presence, as though unexpected meetings with their best Agent-she knew she was that, even though they'd never admit it-were everyday occurrences. Of course, everyone was used to her doing what she was told, despite her reputation as a wild one...

"Lords, I seek audience" she said, opening with the required formal pattern of speech. She'd never liked speaking like that. After all, what was wrong with conventional speech? It reduced time wasted for one thing.

"Enter freely and of you own free will, Selena Alice Hayden. You are welcome here" replied the Lord right of centre-Amherst, if she was identifying his voice correctly. Thomas Amherst.

"Lords, there is a matter of great importance that I wish to discuss with you. The matter of truth and nature, of _Hyperborea_" she said, which _did_ provoke a reaction from all three old men. Their heads snapped up in unison, which, while almost entertaining, answered her question before they'd said a word. A bitter smile twisted her face, that meant it was true. Why wasn't she surprised?

"Hyperborea is an old, old story, Selena, almost forgotten. Why would you wish to discuss this matter with us?" answered the middle Lord-Joseph DeRange, she could tell, even though she had yet to see any mans face.

"I wish to discuss the matter with the High Council because _I_ am of Hyperborea" she replied, a response which made all of the Lords visibly stiffen. Her smile simply disappeared at that, their own reactions said everything. She should kill them all for this...

"Lords, allow me to be direct. The documents, drawings and legends I have been "helping" others with that nobody else can quite comprehend? These are remnants of my fathers time, are they not? I have a rudimentary understanding of things lost and forgotten since before the last Fall of Humanity itself, some things which perhaps should not _be_ remembered, which you...just...didn't..._tell_...me...about...and which you thought I would never find out about. Am I even a living thing to you, Lords?" she asked, bluntly.

"Selena" replied the third Lord, speaking at last-Adolfus Schein, she identified him as by his voice-"Matters are not and never are so simple. What we do within these halls we do for the good of all Humanity and those who come after us all. We _must_ do what must be done, no matter how much it may cost us, personally or in the way of good will to others. There _is_ no choice in this for us. You know that better than any" said Adolfus, rising to his feet so he could look down on her from six feet above her head.

Did he actually think any sort of physical intimidation would work on her? She'd killed things which would stop the heart of a mortal glimpsed out of the corner of an eye and fought her way across other Dimensions for the Brimstone Society. She'd slaughtered her way across Creation itself and stared Death in the eye, literally, because she'd _known_ she was making the world a safer, better place following the Brimstone Societies Orders. All because they were the family she'd never really had...

It had all been a lie, though, she knew that for a fact now. The only reason they would all be reacting to her the way they were would be because they had manipulated her into such a position that her unquestioning obedience would never be challenged by simple facts. Facts like they'd known the truth of her origins all along...

"I know one other thing as well, Lords" she replied, grimly, "That those who serve here do so willingly or not at all. My human "Father" was Ridden by a Hyperborian Demon the night of my Conception and, as such, I am neither Human nor Monster. Instead, I am the very last remains of a dead Race and, as such, have no calling beyond what I wish" she said, her lips pressed thin as she tried not to let her anger spill out of her visibly.

"My Lords" she finished, very finally. "I Resign..."

_London, 1862_

The rugged old mans smooth, thinning hair was largely grey, shot through with traces of black, but his eyes were the same true blue she remembered, even though they now carried shadows and the weight of many years of life. His face was wrinkled, but it just added character in his case, while his creaking old body was still strong with hard muscle a man twenty years younger than him would have been proud of. He wore hard black leather boots, dark brown leggings and tunic, a silver six-pointed star on a silver chain with a single gem set in the centre, a bloody ruby that shone oddly in the daylight, around his neck. With his dark-tanned skin and years it all made him look like what he was, an aged, Retired Adventurer and Explorer who had never learnt how to quit, or fail.

Sitting in the London taproom across from her, as they both ignored the stink of tobacco, spilt beer, vomit and old paint, Selena found herself trying once again to imagine the baby face of the child she'd known to compare it to the face of this old man, sixty-seven years old and looking old enough to be her father. It was hard, but not impossible. His face had filled out and hardened, his eyes had grown deeper and darker, he had more hair as an old man than he had as a new-born, even though he was now loosing it. Grey stubble showed on his chin and cheeks, but his smile took ten years off of his age.

He reached over past her beer and took her hand, squeezed it-how long had it been since she'd allowed anyone to touch her like that?-then nodded to her in appreciation. "Thanks for the beer" he growled, his voice a deep rumble, "Although I prefer the company, thanks" he said, with a bright smile. Somehow, despite her shock, she still managed to smile back.

His name was Thomas Jeffrey Hayden and, incredibly, he was the Brother she'd never had, the Baby sibling she'd thought lost forever sixty-seven years ago. Somehow, he'd tracked her down after almost seven decades apart and now? Now, she was at an uncharacteristic loss for words. _Brother_...that wasn't a word she'd ever, _ever_ imagined she'd be able to apply to herself, a _family_...

"Selena...Sister, I know it's been a long time, but can you at least try and talk to me? I'm starting to think you might have died of shock and I would much rather you hadn't?" asked Thomas, slowly and carefully.

"...I...I'm fine, sorry, Thomas...Brother mine. It's just...um...God's, I was sure you were dead years ago with "our" parents to look after and raise you... I thought Grandfather would drown you and burn the body to prevent you from ever turning out like me..." she managed, almost stammering. She actually felt embarrassed, which hadn't happened to her since her first awkward fumblings with her very first lover when she'd been with the Brimstone Society. She'd been just a girl then...

Thomas's face darkened at the mention of their family, not at all to her surprise. After what had happened to her, she had no doubt that he would have a very rough life at the very least, never free of the suspicion that he could or would turn out anything like her. She was a..._thing_...which was difficult to explain, a being quite possibly unique in human history. Her Brother, though, was entirely human and, as such, would never have been able to understand an adult's attitude to him, let alone the fear of his own parents.

"Grandfather died in 1808, his heart just stopped one day. Father died coughing up blood in 1813. Mother killed herself in 1815 when I found out what had happened to you and walked out for good. After I fought in the War of Independence I was in no mood for more lies when I got back home and, well, that finished her, after I met an old man who'd lost his wits the day you tried to gut Mother when you caught her with that man. When I found out you were alive for sure I had to find you, as simple as that. I've been looking for you ever since" said Jonathon, with a gentle shrug.

"That's quite possibly the kindest thing anyone has ever said to me, Jonathon, thank you" she replied, still not quite sure what to say. Thankfully, her Brother clearly wanted to talk where she was having difficulty. Did he have any real idea what she was? What she'd done? If he didn't, how could she tell him anything?

"First things first" said Jonathon, reaching up and removing the necklace he was wearing. He passed it to her, pressing it into her hand and closing her fingers around it. "I want you to have this. It's an Amulet of Passage, you know what one is? Good" he said, as her eyes widened, "Don't ask me where I found it, just accept it, my gift to you to remember me by. Now, where shall we begin?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

After a moment, she actually chuckled, a genuine, warm chuckle of the kind she rarely enjoyed. Then she leant over the table and hugged him tightly, being careful to do just enough to comfort him...

"You know" she said, snuggling into him tightly as his hugged her back, "I don't think I've ever done this before and meant it as a comfort..."

_Tibet, 1900_

She'd been on her way back from her decade with the Ancient Chinese, heading into China with the intent to catch a train out of the country and work her way across-country all the way back to Britain, London in particular, when the very fact that Tibet was so cold and silent, more often than not, had told her what was happening. She'd heard far-off shouts and screams, the clash of steel on steel, then death screams. _Human_ death screams…

The stink of freshly spilled blood had filled her nose even as she'd leapt to her feet and started running. She was so agile she easily ran atop the snowfields, while she had no need to worry about the ice since her eyes could easily spot any before she came anywhere near it. The heat generated inside and around her by her tattoos didn't change at all as she ran, nor should it have.

Even as she ran the stink of blood grew stronger and thicker, which could only mean that more and more was being spilt. Blood quickly grew thin and tasteless in this cold climate, so either a battle was occurring-which she would enjoy joining in-or a massacre was occurring, which meant she would stop it _if_ it was monsters against humans. More than likely by killing the monsters.

That was when she finally caught the scents hidden under the stink of spilt blood, the offensive stench of unwashed, bloodstained feral Werewolves-and the sharp, sweet scent of a soaped and snow-washed Dhampir, a scent so unique she could never mistake it for anything else. That made her decision easy. Dhampir were little like her, there _was_ nothing else like her on or off of the Earth, but the Half-Breed Dhampir were far more like her than most. On top of which, she didn't really like Werewolves...

The fight was short, sweet, violent and bloody, just the way she liked them. When she knelt down in front of the girl Dhampir, she did wonder how the girl was going to react to what she'd witnessed. But the curious, intelligent eyes that stared at her from the girls face told their own story. She could use that, but should she?

"Mynce" said the young girl, all of maybe twelve years old? "My name is Mynce..."

/The End of The Beginning/


End file.
